Lathis's Unecessary Rants About Useless Topics

[Lathis]

I'll get us started with a few oldies but goodies that everyone who knows me has had to hear multiple times.

The American Penny: When can we please eliminate single cent currency from modern commerce? You know what you can buy with a penny - a big steamy pile of freaking nothing! It's just Abraham Lincoln looking all smug in his big chair and mustachless beard, guilting us into continuing the manufacture of a coin worth only $0.01 that costs $0.02 to make. Can you think of better uses for all that zinc and copper? I can - it's called "anything else". Next time you see a penny on the street - STOMP ON IT.

Daylight Savings Time: I'm not fooled. Do you don't "gain" an hour or "lose" an hour. You just screw up the clock in my car. What, the poor school kids might have to stand in the dark at the bus stop? Guess what, I had to stand in the dark at the bus stop, and I turned out just fine. The idea of DST was first suggested in the 1890s - you know what else they believed in the 1890s? That enemas using tobacco smoke would revive someone who drowned. Hmm, smoke up the A$$ and daylight savings time... coincidence? I think not.

Grape Flavored Gum/Candy/Soda: WTH, America? Just WTH?


I know you guys have some good ones to add!

 

[MelissaB]

OMG! I never thought about where that saying came from! I would not want to give or get that kind of medical treatment, LOL.

 

[Galaxy]

Grape Flavored Gum/Candy/Soda: WTH, America? Just WTH?

Whoa, hey now! That was my faaaaaavorite flavor up until I learned I can't digest the buttloads of blue dye they use in the drinks (as well as learning what food is SUPPOSED to taste like).

 

[kinyonga]

You made my day!!!
Glad I'm not the only one with feelings about some of these things...at least Canada got rid of the penny/cent....and he dollar and two dollar BILLS were replaced with coins!

I've hated daylight savings time forever...In the winter I would like to have the extra hour of light at the end of the day.

No problem with grape flavor though.

Frustrated with the post office right now...they are going to stop door to door delivery and have boxes in various spots in the neighborhood for us to pick up our mail at. My problem is I won't be able to get to them in the winter so I'm now going to have to inconvenience a neighbor to pick it up for me and deliver it to my house.

Good to be able to vent...so carry on!

 

[FlChamMom]

The banker in me, although I am itching for a truly boring lecture on the cost to society of making a .05 divisible monetary system, does nonetheless completely agree on the Daylight Savings nonsense...

As grape is my favorite flavor of Tootsie Pops you are on your own with that one.

 

[Mike Fisher]

I've hated daylight savings time forever...In the winter I would like to have the extra hour of light at the end of the day.

Then you actually like daylight saving time. When we "fall back" for the winter, that's actually just regular time.

 

[Mike Fisher]

Daylight Savings Time: What, the poor school kids might have to stand in the dark at the bus stop? Guess what, I had to stand in the dark at the bus stop, and I turned out just fine.

You are actually advocating staying in DST through the winter. Not a bad idea really, other than really late sunrises. I think I'd prefer it to getting dark @ around 3:30pm here.

 

[Mike Fisher]

Here's a rant to add.....New predictions cite a 12 percent chance in every decade of a coronal ejection from the sun wiping out all electronics on Earth. Further predictions say that when this happens, 90 percent of humans in industrialized countries will perish from thirst, starvation, disease, and mass violence. In addition, it may take a hundred years or more from that event to regain to the level we were at, if ever.

It will only cost 2 billion dollars to retrofit all essential infrastructure in the USA to shield it from EMP. That means we could protect the power grid, have water to drink and flush our toilets with, and still be able to maintain a somewhat crippled existence for about five years while we rebuild our electronics.

Just think about a life with no electronics, no satellites for GPS, no cell phones, and any newer car will not work. True darkness at night, everywhere. Meltdowns at every nuclear power plant in the world because they can't keep cores cool without pumping water. It will be the end of the world as we know it and for most of us, the end of our lives.

Those with gardens and solar cells will be fine for a week or two until they are slaughtered by roving bands of cold starving people who will take whatever they need to survive.

Those people that I always considered wackos building underground bunkers don't seem so crazy now.

A 12 percent chance every ten years. One just missed us two years ago and they didn't tell us until afterwards how close we came to the brink. It is not a question of "if", it is "when". Scary stuff.

So there's my rant: Why the heck are we not protecting our infrastructure? 2 billion dollars, that's it.

 

[Lathis]

You are actually advocating staying in DST through the winter. Not a bad idea really, other than really late sunrises. I think I'd prefer it to getting dark @ around 3:30pm here.

Actually, yes, I am. I think that would be awesome.

 

[kinyonga]

You're right Mike...I want it to stay light longer in the evening in the winter.

 

[Mike Fisher]

So now we love DST and hate regular time! lol

IIRC, certain regions have tried staying in DST year round with mixed reviews. In the winter, I think I'd prefer going to work in the dark and coming home in the light compared to going to work in the dark and coming home in the dark as it is now. If you work in a windowless environment, you only see the sun on your days off, if you don't live in the Pacific Northwest that is. Grey all winter here.

 

[kinyonga]

What can I say...we knew what we meant!!
I really wish summer daylight would stay here all year so it would be light until about nine pm... to tell the truth.

Still thinking about the post about the world crisis you made. This world really needs to smarten up for sure.

 

[Mike Fisher]

Still thinking about the post about the world crisis you made. This world really needs to smarten up for sure.

Most countries are more prepared than the USA. Really scary prediction that a bad sunspot could wipe out 200 million people in the USA within one year. Primitive countries would not even notice anything was wrong, because they all grow their own food, fetch their own water.

 

[xephyr17]

I laughed so freaking hard at this. I'm with you!!

 

[CarlC]

Most countries are more prepared than the USA. Really scary prediction that a bad sunspot could wipe out 200 million people in the USA within one year. Primitive countries would not even notice anything was wrong, because they all grow their own food, fetch their own water.

Mike most countries have a government that believes in science. We aren't one of those countries though.

Carl

 

[Lathis]

Useless Rant of the Day: August 16

We have sent a man to the moon. We can transplant entire limbs. Fully functioning Artificial Intelligence is right around the corner. The human genome has been mapped. Average life spans have nearly doubled over the last century. There are sneakers that transform themselves into roller skates.

...and yet, WE CAN'T MAKE SOCKS WITHOUT A STUPID SEAM RIGHT ALONG THE TOE! Put the sock on slightly wrong, and the darn thing rubs your foot all day long. Try to adjust it? You can't. It always rotates back. Seriously, people, we need to get our best minds on this stat!

 

[Mike Fisher]

Mike most countries have a government that believes in science. We aren't one of those countries though.

Carl

That and the fact we can't get any laws passed because of political infighting, no space budget because narrow minded politicians think that space is a dead end and we have too many problems on Earth to devote money toward it.

So clueless that they don't realize that a lot of today's technology was developed or made possible by our space programs. Not just Tang and TV dinners and aluminum foil....GPS anyone? Satellite TV, solar cells, water purification, safer tires, scratch resistant lenses, heart pumps, memory foam, robotic prosthetics for amputees, even the in ear thermometer that they use at your doctor's office to take your temperature. Tons more, too many to list. Nope nothing to learn in space.......lol.

I'll be out back digging my bunker now.

 

[Mike Fisher]

...and yet, WE CAN'T MAKE SOCKS WITHOUT A STUPID SEAM RIGHT ALONG THE TOE!

Sure we can. But the USA consumer won't like the price, so no company is willing to invest in it.

 

[Lathis]

Sure we can. But the USA consumer won't like the price, so no company is willing to invest in it.

Stop killing the funny, man!
...Leave some room for me in that bunker, though...

 

[Mike Fisher]

Stop killing the funny, man!

Ok, sorry. Here's a light-hearted rant from me today....Micro-brew IPA in an aluminum can?! What the heck is up with that? I did a favor for a friend and he paid me in canned beer?!

Cans are for Coors light. I'll drink my IPA from a bottle thank you very much.