A bit of unexpected excitement yesterday- I went to school to do some work, and while a reaction was running, I was doing some cleaning in the lab I inherited (which is an absolute wreck, filled with 20+ years of junk, broken stuff, papers, ancient cracked rubber hoses…), and on one of the benchtops, a glint caught my eye. Looking more closely, I noticed that there was a shit-ton of mercury droplets. Oh fuck. And of course, there were even more on the floor around that bench. This is considered to be a bad thing, given that the stuff is… somewhat toxic. Fortunately, I was able to reach our head of Health & Safety. Even more fortunately, he’s a common-sense guy who knew better than to panic and call in all the alphabet soup agencies; he and I did a two man cleanup. I suggested using tuna to sponge it up. That was a bit beyond what he thought was funny. Ah well. My personality is definitely mercurial.
Birthdays today include a candidate for the biggest dick to ever grace the Supreme Court; a guy who graces the driveway of every dentist and gynecologist; a complicated guy with fascinating contradictions; a great pianist whose talent for jazz is almost forgotten; a guy who jumped around a lot wearing tights; a guy who pioneered the Teflon football; the prototypical Jew-hating leftist; the whiniest person to ever lace up; a horsefaced publicity hound (to mix metaphors); and the world’s luckiest retiree.
Let’s do some links before the Minamata disease sets in.
So the dude is captured, why is the St. Paddy parade canceled?
This is vandalism we can all approve of.
So now the PLO is more sensible than Team Blue.
This just gets goofier and goofier.
“How could this happen? We used the same people who did the Obamacare website!”
Not our fucking business. No way any of this ends well with our “help.” The crushed Palestinian Arabs from a few days ago are a perfect metaphor.
Wait, it’s supposed to give notice? Of course, the most important thing is its carbon footprint.
This has long been one of my favorite bands. And after yesterday’s emergency, Tomb Raider and I watched them tear up the house at Rochester’s Kodak Center. Fantastic picking, singing, and songwriting.
Holy mackerel – that could have been a mess. Hope the TLAs don’t end up getting involved anyway — that would make me throw up my hands scream “Ahi!” and run away.
The really rough thing about mercury poisoning is that I don’t think there’s much the medical community can do about it — but what do I know… I’m no sturgeon.
Obviously obligatory.
Yes, we’re really lucky to have the EHS guy we do. And we have a separate connection- he’s a local native of a certain age and went through school and was friends with SP.
Mercury cleanup (especially in this messed up state) is part of the reason I really resent the move to CFLs a decade or so back that were pretty much mandatory before LEDs became cheaper, reliable and widespread.
I still have several of those (either non-working or from where I replaced them with LEDs) and can just imagine the hoops I’ll have to jump through to “properly dispose” of them. If California hasn’t introduced a good deal of mercury leaking through the landfills through tossed CFLs embedded in household garbage because folks don’t know (or don’t care), I would be stunned.
I’d ask out of pure curiosity what the non-tuna cleanup method entails — but you should probably stick with plausible deniability and not get into specifics…
I will say, if he’s an old friend of SP – I’m a little surprised you transgressed the boundaries of acceptable humor so easily. 😉 But props to the guy, definitely.
Zinc and sulfur do an excellent job of soaking it up and binding it.
Thanks!
I’m having to deal with ignitrons, a type of high-current, high voltage switch that’s chock full of mercury.
We have mercury “sniffer” equipment to check the air quality and plenty of mercury spill kits. Not fun when an ignitron cuts loose.
Hopefully the new solid state switches we are about to try can replace the mercury beasts.
I’m going to perch at a safe distance and wait for Swissie to narrow his gaze at the crappie puns.*
*Yes, I know they’re freshwater fish. Best I could at my current caffeination level.
Its not that serious of an infraction. I doubt he’ll call the cods.
Bassed. /As the yutes say.
Tuna? You can’t use tuna, it’s already saturated, you want something with more absorption potential. That chart says you should be using salmon!
I would expect salmon would only work if the mercury is still running.
You’re just trying to evoke the mental image of a doctor who is both, aren’t you?
*queues up ‘Teeth’ in DVD player*
Heh.
Good morning! My kid and I did her FAFSA a few days ago. It was actually quicker than previous years. Guess our delay got us past the glitches.
They figure the Irish just want to celebrate by themselves, alone after the troubles?
I love it when they siege the wrong house. *waves tiny USA flag*
Hmm, ourselves, alone – clever idea, wonder what that sounds like in Gaelic?
That pun is a Fail!
I now see what he did there.
You know it doesn’t care about that — This is MAGMA country!
whaddup doh’
yo whats goody yo
TALL SABBATH CANS!
Can you get the green stuff in tall cans?
Non-alcoholic — but you can get these tall cans at least.
(I have a couple of co-workers who are Upper Midwest based and they pointed me at this brewery recently… their root beer is acceptable — not fantastic, but good. Might try their ginger ale at some point, but my golden standard for that is this — which is in the “don’t breath when bringing drink to your lips” category of ginger ale, so I doubt it would supplant it).
Thanks! I particularly like a good ginger ale. (Maybe it’s a redhead thing! 👩🦰) And, of course, obligatory.
Yeah… one of the many, many things I don’t understand about the Middle East in particular (and quite likely politics and humanity in general). If you keep invading / killing / “insurrection”-ing your enemy for what, 70+ years now… and all it has gotten you is dependency on relief packages and your enemy for your infrastructure whereas everytime you go “ceasefire” (to rearm) you could actually build some things and not have people dying all the time…. wouldn’t some moderates eventually be able to say “Look — we’re never going to love these guys… but this ain’t working and maybe it would be nice to not kill our children for a generation or two?”
I get that the neighboring *cough* Iran *cough* states like using them for proxies. I get the mindfrakking from a very young age… but at a minimum “This isn’t working… the other way would let us build up our strength!” would seem to arise.
Which is my long winded, rambling way of saying I would think this would be a golden opportunity for non-Hamas Palestinian politicians to make inroads and topple their regime, even if their plan is only to ceasefire long enough to get where they think they can try again…. (And yes, the parts I don’t understand is that probably it is still political suicide to ‘surrender to the infidel’ by pausing or something… even though they’ve done it lots and we all know the Quran specifically is cool with “lull the infidel into a false sense of security as needed” and all…)
I’m personally glad I’m not in a society or part of the country where generations-old conflicts are a concern, is all I can say to end this.
but this ain’t working and maybe it would be nice to not kill our children for a generation or two
And how many generations did it take to reach that point in Ireland?
If you don’t kill the children, how do they get the free virgins?
How do you get the free virgins if you don’t kill the children?
Oh, and this “I’m personally glad I’m not in a society or part of the country where generations-old conflicts are a concern, is all I can say to end this.”
All I can say is: have you met Democrats and Republicans?
the whiniest person to ever lace up
Happy Birthday Lebron James? John McEnroe? Tom Brady?
Tonya Harding?
Tonya Harding ?
Heh… a pleasant enough echo.
Only time I ever was seriously tempted to hit a woman was when my ex-wife said I played basketball like Danny Ainge.
I would have thought that only works if she says you play basketball like Ray Rice.
Past the 30 minute mark — so wanted to bring this interesting analysis to folks’ attention if they a) care and b) hadn’t seen it. I know there’s been some discussion on the bill here in recent days, but this dives a bit more into the language than other writeups I’ve seen.
Yes, it ends up supporting my position (“I think TikTok is terrible… but this bill isn’t the way because it opens up a can of censorship possibilities these assholes have already proven they’ll happily exploit.”), but I swear that’s not why I linked it. 😉
That’s my position too. Blair White has some videos about TikTok and social contagion regarding transgenderism and mental illness. It’s disturbing. But like you, I don’t trust these MF’ers with any more power. They will 100% exploit it.
‘Shanahan who is known for paying for Kennedy’s Super Bowl commercial, is expected to be formally named as the vice-presidential candidate, aligning with Kennedy on various issues crucial to their campaign.’
Hot Take: Shanahan will have a lead of at least ten points only to choke it all away in the fourth quarter.
Usually the VP is there for electoral support instead of financial — but hey, whatever works.
…I was just making a dumb football joke…
Would’ve worked even better if it was Schottenheimer.
I am guessing all this time with a Kennedy will leaver under water…
Some years ago, we used mercury filled u-tube manometers to measure pressures.
At a t test in Kentucky, one of the guys was collecting samples using vacuum tanks, and the manometers to record before/after pressures. One of his sources was under a very high pressure and he was sure he had things choked-down/bled off using a manifold and some needle valves. At the end of one test, he was recording all the vacuums on the tanks not realizing he had pressurized one. Two representatives of the Kentucky Environmental Cabinet were watching and talking. He connected the line to the manometer, opened the valve and…..BLAM!
Showered 2 people (and the inside of our trailer- these were 36″ manometers) with free mercury.
Its a long story, but hilarity failed to ensue. We never got paid for the project (approx $90K job), and from that I learned that the statute of limitations for professional liability in that state is 1 year. Afterwards I made to decision to use NIST-traceable digital pressure gauges.
(They tried to sue us about 10 days after the year had passed).
Between moving, regular work, and side jobs, this my first day off in…(checks calendar) twenty-one days…and it’s St. Patrick’s Day…Fuck it, I’m making a big ass breakfast then day drinking. Enjoy yourselves, kiddos! I’m off!
P.S. Hope our Midwest Glibs didn’t endure too much damage after that hail storm. I just bought a new to me used car and that motherfucker got pounded. Fourty plus dents on the body and I only carry liability. Whatever, just keep running.
“Fourty plus dents on the body”
yikes!
Sorry 🙁
If you can see forty dents, there’s probably more like two or three hundred under the right light. And proper hail repair is a manual process on each and every effing dent.
Ask me how I know.
Good to hear from you TH! Hows the new job working out?
Accuracy wise, I did not have the luck of the Irish today (which since I think I’m more Slovak/Scot/German mutt, makes sense):
I played https://squaredle.com/xp 03/17:
*20/20 words (+2 bonus words)
🎯 Perfect accuracy
I played https://squaredle.com 03/17:
*65/65 words (+6 bonus words)
🎯 In the top 8% by accuracy
🔥 Solve streak: 289
I played https://squaredle.com/xp 03/17:
*20/20 words (+9 bonus words)
📖 In the top 2% by bonus words
I played https://squaredle.com 03/17:
*65/65 words (+16 bonus words)
📖 In the top 2% by bonus words
🔥 Solve streak: 175
I played https://squaredle.com 03/17:
65/65 words (+16 bonus words)
📖 In the top 2% by bonus words
I played https://squaredle.com 03/17:
0/65 words
Play streak: 201
Meh, I’ll get around to it maybe.
Reposting this for OMWC and the morning crew. Excellent discussion with Institute for Justice.
https://www.nationalreview.com/podcasts/the-charles-c-w-cooke-podcast/the-single-most-egregious-violation-of-the-fourth-amendment/
Interesting reading (well, skimming). Why is he completely absent from the “common knowledge” for lack of a better phrase.
I mentioned to Tomb Raider that it was his birthday, and she had never heard of him, either. Which is doubly weird given her political bent.
But yeah I was being cheeky.
If the gay didn’t take him out of the older history books, his complicated politics would have, it seems.
HAPPY ST. PATRICK’S DAY!!
Lá fhéile Pádraig sona dhuit! 🥔 🥃🍻🇮🇪
“AOC’s NYC district slammed as ‘Third World’ as shocking video shows trash-covered streets overrun by migrants running ‘flea market’ and scantily-clad prostitutes brazenly soliciting men at ‘Market of Sweethearts'”
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-13205713/AOCs-NYC-district-slammed-World-shocking-video-shows-trash-covered-streets-overrun-migrants-running-flea-market-scantily-clad-prostitutes-brazenly-soliciting-men-Market-Sweethearts.html
I wonder why they blur out the hookers’ faces?
Association with AOC?
I didn’t see the “overflowing trash” but I did see flea market items that were not there a few years ago. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
Not my cup of tea but “you get what you vote for” or some crap.
I read that three times as “drinks” and “Minnesota disease”.
You need more coffee.
I worked with them directly. They were dumped on us from the WH after their epic fail. Then they proceeded to fuck up our shit.
It’s making me angry just thinking about it, and it was a long time ago. That’s how thoroughly they fucked up a functional team and website.
But I bet they were properly diverse! 🙄
Nope – two white frat boys and their frat boy minions. These people never practice what they preach
Frat Boy minions? We called them Little Sisters back in the college town.
Pincushions.
“Harrowing story of the boy who was fed to PIGS, as family wins $1m lawsuit against Kansas over brutal murder of Adrian Jones by his evil father”
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-13206317/Kansas-Adrian-Jones-lawsuit-torture-family-pigs.html
Did they remove the teeth and the hair?
On a serious note, is there a way to reform CPS? They seem to go after innocent parents while ignoring monsters.
Monsters are scary and probably dangerous, would you want to mess with one of them on a bureaucrat’s salary? Particularly when you can go intimidate some other people with basically zero risk?
From a woman I used to know who worked for CPS in SAC, that is precisely the case. No one wanted to go to the really scary places, but still needed shit to report. You can guess the rest (and already have, it looks like.)
And if you are a coward (which is exactly what I’ve described), then bullying people that are frightened of you (not really you, but the state that has your back) is a great way to feel better about yourself.
Bingo.
Once again, I say that I have no problem with the death penalty in principle. It’s just a matter of who gets it.
And those two should be killed for what they did.
I’m against the death penalty. I’m also thinking that if people are that fucked up, it’s not much of a deterrent.
I doubt it has that much of an additional deterrent effect. I just think they should be killed for what they did.
A big part of the death penalty is society saying “you are not fit to live with other humans, and we don’t want to infect others with your evil.”
It is no deterrent at all, it is more like cleaning up the mercury so that more people aren’t exposed.
There are prisons for that.
Is life in prison really not as bad as death? Sure, there is always the chance that the innocent person has been railroaded; I’d prefer to deal with that by holding the prosecutor and police liable for the same punishment for doing that.
^. I’ll add my objection to money being forcibly taken from taxpayers in order to keep evil alive in prison
Undocumented tourists were already charged for insurrection. How much farther before the government starts executing their political enemies?
“I’d prefer to deal with that by holding the prosecutor and police liable for the same punishment for doing that.”
Ignoring that will never happen, people do make honest mistakes. Judges and juries are not infallible.
I’m not in favor of the death penalty, but arguing that life in prison is a lesser punishment? I don’t get that.
Wait, it’s supposed to give notice?
And buy offsets.
Influencers
While Ashcroft positioned himself as a champion for working class voters, emails obtained by CNN and the progressive watchdog group Documented show that he was steered toward adopting his “anti-woke” investment regulation by a little-known, right-wing think tank with deep ties to conservative billionaires. The communications show that officials with the Foundation for Government Accountability suggested regulatory language to Ashcroft and even wrote an op-ed article that Ashcroft published in a national conservative magazine under his own name.
The emails not only reveal FGA’s influence over Ashcroft, they offer a snapshot of the group’s growing influence across the country, particularly in red states. And that influence can carry a high cost for workers and taxpayers.
I know you are, but what am I? Shadowy cabals of monied-interest puppeteers. It’s all so fucking tedious.
the biggest dick to ever grace the Supreme Court
Happy birthday, Justice Long Dong Silver! No, I’ll pass on the can of Coke.
the whiniest person to ever lace up
Happy birthday, Nancy Kerrigan and Eli Manning!
I don’t remember Eli being whiny.
The little bitch said he wouldn’t play football if he was drafted by the Chargers.
Just followed in the steps of John Elway.
I wouldn’t want to play for the Chargers either. Then he went on to how many consecutive starts, and won two Super Bowls.
I remember when the Chargers were good, four decades ago. Dan Fouts, Rolf Benirschke.
That was a long time ago.
Yeah, about forty years.
The group’s communications with Ashcroft and Gray, neither of whom responded to questions from CNN, give a rare glimpse into how billionaire megadonors use think tanks like FGA to advance their causes out of public view. Federal tax laws allow such donors to channel millions of dollars anonymously, through nonprofit foundations, to activist organizations that lobby for and work behind the scenes to enact legislation that reflects partisan political goals.
FGA enjoys tax-exempt status as a charitable organization. It received more than $44 million from six conservative foundations tied to billionaire donors from 2013 through 2022, the most recent year for which tax records are available. Those foundations also have financed much of the push to tighten voting laws and spread election disinformation across the country since the 2020 election.
All of which are exclusively the province of right wing plutocrats who want to turn the clock back to the Gilded Age.
Ministry of Truth
The Supreme Court on Monday will be weighing whether the government crossed a constitutional line into censorship of lawful speech when it pressured social media platforms to take down content it deemed misleading.
The case poses a significant test of the First Amendment’s free speech protections in the digital age and stems from the Biden administration’s efforts to pressure social media platforms to remove content that it said spread falsehoods about the COVID-19 pandemic and the 2020 presidential election.
The Supreme Court is set to consider at what point the federal government’s attempts to protect against misinformation on social media cross into censorship of speech that is constitutionally protected.
Dissent is treason.
Since when is it the federal government’s job to protect against “misinformation” (whatever the Hell that is)?
That base wasn’t just stolen, it vanished into thin air.
We have members of congress openly saying “the freedom of speech is not absolute.” You can sue for libel and slander, and there are laws against threatening people. Other than that, it is absolute, so GFY.
It won’t make much, if any, difference if SCOTUS tells them to knock it off. It will be interesting to see how the Justices line up, and what the rationalizations will be for saying that the government should have the power to control communications amongst the citizenry.
Now you’ve got me really dreading another Roberts’ ruling of disorder.
“The court imposed unprecedented limits on the ability of the president’s closest aides to speak about matters of public concern, on the FBI’s ability to address threats to the nation’s security, and on CDC’s ability to relay public-health information,” Solicitor General Elizabeth Prelogar, who represents the government before the Supreme Court, said.
She argued that senior Biden administration officials were using the bully pulpit to push social media companies to address falsehoods on their platforms, which has never been a free speech violation. As long as the government is seeking to inform and persuade, and not compel, Prelogar wrote, its speech does not run afoul of the First Amendment.
“Influence is also the natural result of successful efforts to inform, to persuade, or to criticize,” Prelogar wrote. “That the platforms often acted in response to the government’s communications thus does not remotely show that those communications were coercive.”
Just a friendly chat over a cup of tea. There was no coercion, merely incredibly compelling logical arguments against dangerous lies and treason.
I love being lied to my face. No EH Taylor? Yeah, right. The fucking inventory numbers are online, you lying pricks.
The state ABC is lying to you and won’t let you buy Taylor jug wine?
That base wasn’t just stolen, it vanished into thin air.
Lives were saved.
An Irish tune for yez
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HKFPMyauvbk
Exhausting
“Many of our people are exhausted,” he continued. “We work the longest hours of any people in the industrialized world. I think it’s time for a shortened workweek.”
Vaughn attempted to ask the same question for a second time and Sanders cut her off again, waving his hand in front of her face. Vaughn asked the senator how businesses would survive a shortened workweek, and Sanders argued that Amazon owner Jeff Bezos pays a lower tax rate than the average worker, which shows “we have a real problem with our tax system.”
“I think that billionaires have got to start paying their fair share of taxes,” he said.
Hey, look over there!
Working 32 hours will just give people an extra day to work a second job. How about not destroying our economy, so people can afford to live on one job?
Golly, why is Hertz in trouble?
“How do we democratize access to electric vehicles? That’s a very important part of our strategy,” interim CEO Mark Fields said at the time. “Tesla is the only manufacturer that can produce EVs at scale.”
I tripped over that nugget and haven’t managed to get past it yet.
“Democratize EVs”? WTF? Your job is to rent reliable convenient cars at the best price possible for you and your customers, you fucking moron. Oh, wait, you’re that Mark Fields, who did such a bang-up job at Ford? It all makes sense now.
This week, Hertz announced that Scherr was stepping down and would be replaced by Gil West, the former COO of General Motors’ Cruise robotaxi unit. While Scherr took over after the Tesla deal, under his leadership Hertz continued its focus on EVs, placing orders for some with GM and Polestar.
That’ll fix it.
I shall be mostly around. I am about to take a Virtual Job Tryout for a CVS full-time gig I applied to. I have no idea what this will entail, but “may take up to 90 minutes.” Hrm. I’m quite observant, clever and (in general) intelligent. I am. I’ve also ALWAYS had massive ADHD issues. I was born in ’87. Toddler Ev used to repeatedly run into walls as a joke. (Huh.) I am shocked that I was injected with the shit I got last week from my psychiatrist.
^^ I also have a story about her. She’s a rubber stamp for pills in an extremely wealthy city. She also uses her hots for her gain. I would let her seduce me.
Important legit forgotten point: I’m quite smart. Equally, I’m largely incapable of concentrating. My bro has the laser focus from Dad. I am, in my own sphere, complete diffusion. This has served me (about) equally both well and for ill.
¿Quien?
Injected? with what?
Any ADHD shit. I’ve recently been on Ritalin and Adderall. And NOW! Hot, legal drug-dealer psych has me on straight-up “Amphetamine Salts.” Now I’m on Day 10 waiting for a monthly scrip of 40mg Vyvanse, aka Lisdexamfetamine. On the plus side, she listened somewhat to my lack of extra funds. I’m getting a month supply of that shit, or am supposed to. Another psych said I should “run back to her” cuz no one else would look at my med chart and prescribe me half of the shit I’m on. (Clonozepam w my history? It IS a legit anti-convulsent, and anxiety is hands-down my biggest epileptic trigger. I’m also surrounded by it.)
I mostly got and get away with my never-ending stray thoughts cuz I’m (observably) well-behaved and I did well in my studies. (I just didn’t always care to learn certain things. Math and risk aversion come to mind.)
CVS warehouse job applied to. It is a sincerely perfect gig for me. Schedule, accountability, and not being surrounded by popcorn children. All I really need is hours, shit to do, and $$. This is a great step if it goes further.
World’s Largest Space Marine Army 150,000 Points
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A-9vQ6RXVAE
nerds