When I was attending university, I used to hang out with my bros in a dorm on campus. I, of course, lived off campus. But they lived in the dorm. It was on the highest hill in Syracuse, and it was a eight floor co-ed dorm.
To move from floor to floor you would take one of a couple of elevators.
Now, an on-going thing that the guys would do would be to slam on the doors to the elevator, and then force it open. Then they would goof around in the open slit.
Now, for the record, I never did this. Oh, I did other stupid things. Some really, REALLY stupid, but this I never did.
- Like getting locked out while up goofing off on the roof.
- Like riding my motorcycle in the elevator on the last day of classes.
- Like firing bottle rockets from the windows on the eighth floor.
But, you know, I never played “slap the door”.
Years later, I visited an old Bro of mine and he told me what happened after I graduated.
It seems that some other guy was playing “slap the door” and the elevator malfunctioned and kept on traveling with him stuck between the open doors. It decapitated him, and the gruesome scene traumatized the entire campus.
I can only imagine.
*shiver*
Todays…
Do you think destabilizing China is worth losing 100 million users in the US?
This is really a very good question. The US is causing minor indigestions to China but growing a cancer in the US with its action! The Chips act will completely bankrupt the entire Chip industry by it childish and irresponsible actions on China! Many US chip companies are nicely profiting off a China that buys a ton of their products to use and to make into products to sell to the world and what the US did destroy their business overnight and forces China to be the strongest and meanest competitor in a couple of years!
US chip sales dropped by 15% and profit even less as an out come of the initial chip ban! The worst part if in 3 years the 85% balance will be lost too! These companies will lay off millions of workers and need compensation from the government for the next generation. How can that make America great again? Too bad you chose to shoot your self on your feet!
Janet Yellen Can’t Hide The Truth Any Longer
Why is a true “random number generator” impossible?
There are lots of great answers here explaining why a deterministic non-random algorithm cannot generate truly random numbers on its own.
What I would like to do is tell you about some of the external outputs being used to generate seed values.
A few years ago, in part thanks to Microsoft, because Windows 11 does not work without one, a special chip started appearing on all computers, not just high-end ones, called a TPM (trusted platform module). Sometimes referred to as “cryptographic co-processor”, it is in charge of many tasks related to cryptography, such as storing encryption keys securely. It is also an excellent source of truly random numbers.
While the specifications leave exact implementation details up to the manufacturer, potential sources for the TPM include semiconductor noise (quantum in nature, completely unpredictable), air movement, keystrokes, etc. All of these are good sources of entropy.
However, my favourite source of entropy is the wall of lava lamps used by CloudFlare!
Once the lamps come to working temperature, the movement of particles within them is extremely chaotic and unpredictable. If I remember correctly, CloudFlare has a camera watching these, it takes a picture of them, which is then turned into a hash used as a seed value for the random number generator.
And it looks pretty while keeping the internet safe!
Why I’m So Happy I Left the USA
Crawfish Gumbo
Ingredients
- 1 1/2 cups crawfish tails
- 2 tablespoons butter
- Crawfish fat and water to make 3 1/2 pints
- 1/4 cup vegetable oil
- 1/4 cup all-purpose flour
- 1 medium onion, chopped
- 2 cloves garlic, chopped
- 1 cup canned whole tomatoes, chopped
- 2 stalks celery, chopped
- Salt and pepper, to taste
- 1 bay leaf
- 1 tablespoon green onion tops
- 1 tablespoon gumbo file
Instructions
- Make a golden roux. Take pot off heat. Add onion, garlic and celery, stir and cook 4 minutes.
- Return to heat. Add tomatoes, and cook for 5 minutes.
- Add fat, water and bay leaf. Bring to a boil. Reduce heat and simmer and add salt and pepper. Simmer for 40 minutes.
- In another skillet, fry in butter over low heat, green onions and tails, for 2 to 3 minutes.
- Add to gumbo. Put in file.
- Serve over hot, cooked rice.
“America Is Getting WIPED OUT” — This Is What’s Coming…
At the age of 16, Cyntoia Brown was sentenced to life imprisonment for the murder of a man. Having survived multiple rapes and assaults, Cyntoia was regularly sold for drug money by her then-boyfriend.
“People were born whor*s. The best thing for you to do is learn how to be a good whor*” – a sentence Cyntoia often heard.
In 2004, Cyntoia met a man who began showing his gun collection. Cyntoia shot the man, stole his truck, wallet and gun. Cyntoia was adamant that she didn’t shoot him to rob him.
She was tried as an adult and spent 15 years in jail.
Whilst her case is unique and controversial, whether guilty or innocent, Cyntoia was described as a “teen prostitute” in court. It was whilst studying for her degree in prison that Cyntoia came across the term ‘sex trafficking’.
She thought: “Why am I only just finding out that there’s no such thing as a teen prostitute? Why are teenagers who are trafficked being told by society that they’re bad, they’re promiscuous?”
It took Cyntoia ten years to come to grips with the fact that she was a victim of trafficking. She is now using her experience to help girls who are in a similar position to her.
The innocent suffering in prison is whom I feel sorry for.
3 things women say that scare men
Who are the smartest nonviolent criminals?
James Verone left his home in Gastonia, North Carolina (USA) and did something that I consider brilliant.
He went to a nearby bank, waiting for his turn, and handed the bank employee a note that read:
“It’s a robbery, please give me a dollar.”
James handed over this note and sat down to wait for the police.
A few days earlier, he had sent a letter to a local newspaper announcing that he would soon commit a theft.
When the local newspaper discovered that a man had tried to steal a dollar, they decided to question him.
It turns out that James was a delivery driver for Coca Cola, and when he lost his job, he also lost his health insurance.
James had to pay for treatment to treat a chest and spine condition that he could not afford.
So he chose to try to rob a bank so he could be put in prison and get government health insurance.
To me, what this man did was an act of desperation, yes, but also a stroke of genius.
Don’t mistake silence for weakness.
What did someone do or say at the bank that made you say, “You gotta be kidding me!”?
I’ve told the story before, but any bad publicity I can give BOA the better. Our local branch frequently is so poorly staffed that there is one teller and one officer. I went inside one day because, well the drive up ATM was broken as it commonly is. I wanted $100 in 20’s and I wanted change for a $20 with ones. There was a line of like 8 people waiting for the one poor teller. So, there is a “mini ATM” right next to the open teller’s window…in front of the windows they never use because of poor staffing. I went to the little ATM and got my $100 in 20’s. Went back and stood in line. Finally get to the teller and ask for the change. “Do you have an account with us?”. “Why, yes I do, in fact I just withdrew the 20’s from yon ATM”…(2’away). “Do you have your bank card?” My answer, quite loudly was: “Why, do you think BOA is dispensing COUNTERFEIT MONEY from their ATM? I just withdrew the money from there” pointing at the ATM. “It’s bank policy”. Everybody behind in line is snickering by now…
Second story, and this was the one that got me out of BOA…I was in the middle of a strange period where my wife and I had sold a house, bought a house, were flipping the second house and buying a third house…all in a little over a year. I was keeping a lot of cash in BOA during almost all that time. There was a brief period where I was getting into a cash squeeze. My financial guy suggested I consider a HELOC loan rather than cashing investments right then. Seemed sound advice…I made an appointment with the ONE officer in my branch. When I showed up, he was of course in another appointment and I waited an hour beyond my time. Finally, discussing the HELOC..They wanted 3 years of all my tax returns including corporate returns (I had also just retired and wasn’t in the corporation anymore), copies of all my financial investment info, etc. Mind you, I owned the house which was worth at least $700k free and clear. It is called a HOME EQUITY loan…AND he told me that it would likely take 3–4 months to process and approve. Well, that killed the deal. I needed the cash in a week. Borrowed the money from life insurance. I then moved to another more local bank, Southatlantic Bank here in SC. SUPER friendly, branch manager gave me his card, personal cell number, told me to call ANYTIME if I needed his help. I asked him how about if I wanted a HELOC loan from them…paperwork, time to approve? This was Wednesday. He said I could have the money Friday. Bye, Bye BOA…I think the “B” stands for Bandits…
CIA Spy : “I Don’t Want To Live In The USA When THIS Happens 2030…”
Shorpy
When did you realize exactly who your son or daughter really was?
When my daughter was 3 in 1990. I learned exactly who she was. It was picture day at school. I chose her Easter dress, a frilly pretty girlie dress. She decided that she would wear a sweatshirt with sequins on it, some pink houndstooth print leggings, troll scrunchi in her hair and troll clips on her shoelaces. We argued for an hour, until we hit the wall for time to get them to school and me to work ontime. I gave in. My daughter was and is a strong woman. Someone who knows what she wants and has a plan to get it. Today she lives in Virginia, studying for her doctorate in environmental biology. She has funded her education herself. We are still incredibly close, i hear from her several times weekly. She is in love with a young scientist from Panama who she met at school. Today i defer to her decisions, she thinks things through very well.
My son, i learned that i had done well when his boss told me that i had raised a very polite young man with a great work ethic. I take that compliment to myself since i raised them both alone. Work ethic is something that i was raised with. once you take a job, you must go every day unless you are so sick you cannot get out of bed. It originally comes from my grandparents who were millworkers. The story about my grandmother is that she walked home for lunch, gave birth to my aunt, then was back at her loom when the lunch bell rang again. I only remember my father taking one day off in his 40 plus years at General Motors. That day, He was hospitalized for kidney stones.
HUAWEI PURA 70 SHOWS CHINA DOESN’T NEED USA – china ignores rantings of senile biden…
Ahem, I have come to the realization that the average anti-China propagandists are just so illiterate and clueless, especially when it comes to tariff. “Chinese products are so cheap that tariff is hanging everywhere”. What do you think tariff does?
Let’s take this simple product on Amazon:
True cost of this hammer:
- Direct from Chinese wholesale: wumao! I mean 50 cents.
- Sold on Temu with free shipping: $5.80
- Sold on Amazon with free shipping: $11.98
- Sold at local Japanese Daiso: $3
I just showed you 4 ways you can buy a hammer with 4 different prices. Now, the first way is not really plausible unless you are ready to buy 5000 hammers at once.
If US mandates a tariff of $5 per hammer, then we will be looking at…
- Temu $10.80
- Amazon $16.98
- Daiso probably will not sell because it’s too expensive.
American consumers are paying $5 more for this simple 50 cent hammer. This $5 will be used to by bombs and missiles to shoot at little boys and girls in Palestine.
China will sell less hammers in the US. But for 50 cent per hammer, they can sell these hammers anywhere else in the world. Not really a big loss.
If US does this to every product from China, then American consumers are easily paying $100-$500 more per month. There is practically no loss to China. For a $5 product, you can pay $5 more. For a $100 product, how much more do you have to pay for tariff?
Then is it a good time to buy American made hammer?
Of course, here you go:
Why I Left America
Today’s comics meme
I’m Leaving the USA Forever
Why is China a threat to the United States?
China is a threat to the US because the narrative of American Exceptionalism no longer holds in a world which is rapidly becoming multi-polar.
The US’s leadership stopped investing in its own social development, becoming removed from most of the society, which became increasingly polarized to the point where nothing could change for the better.
China has shown the weaknesses in American hegemony which happens when the global leader fails to offer a development plan for the world which everyone, regardless of ethnicity and religion, can follow. By investing heavily in its own development, and overseas through its Belt and Road Initiative, China is showing a development path which the Global South and BRICS nations can follow, instead of the old way of relying only on racial, historical and religious differences to keep people divided.
The US stubbornly refuses to adapt to this new reality, which is why the US sees China as a threat.
What is the best comeback you used on someone?
I am disabled but you cannot tell from first glance.
My son was a cart pusher at Walmart and he brought me a scooter. We went into the store and the little old greeter started talking to my son.
While they were talking I stood up and looked in the movies at the RedBox that was a few feet away from them.
She said to him, “look at that fat woman (I weighed 150 lbs to my 5’6 frame) ! She is so lazy! I just hate people like her!”
My son looked at her and said “oh her? That’s my mom. She’s not lazy because if she was, obviously she wouldn’t be here. As for the scooter that she is in, she has epilepsy and her foot is currently broken. Also she was bit by a Tick when she was younger and the doctor said she was fine. She actually has ‘Late Lyme Disease’ and it affects everything from walking to talking. Yes she does have a placard in our car for the handicap parking, and she is stronger than most people I have seen with this disease! Now, would you like to keep judging people who walk or use a scooter in the store, or would you like to keep judging the ‘silent disabled people’?”!
She apologized and headed toward the main office, red in the face.
I told my son he was a bit harsh, even though he didn’t raise his voice and spoke to her kindly. -She was probably in her 80’s- He said he didn’t feel as if he was harsh because right before that she had commented about another person in a scooter. We just hope that she learned to be a bit kinder and to not judge someone before she knows their internal battles.
Rufus Respect
What’s the best thing to do if you drive past a cop over 100mph and you have a headstart?
Many many years ago, I was dating my now ex wife, visiting her in Phoenix. I had a Volkswagen Beetle and as luck would have it, the trans-axle went out Saturday evening. I found another one for sale and one of her friends had the basic tools, jacks, etc to swap it out, but unfortunately I ran out of time before I had to be back at work Sunday night at 10 PM.
Of course being a young and invincible teenager, I worked as long as possible, then at the last minute, borrowed her 1974 Mercury Capri, looking pretty much exactly like this:
Although not a speed demon, that 2.8L V6 would get up to over 120 mph.
As I was getting close to Tucson, realizing I was going to be really late, I decided to “speed up” just a wee bit. Mind you, the speed limit back then was 55 MPH. There was very little traffic around 11PM on I-10, other than semis. I cranked it up to around 120 MPH for several minutes. As I approached a semi, I decided to slow it down a bit, and guess what was on the other side? Yep, Arizona Highway Patrol Officer.
Knowing this was going to be really bad, I just shut it down and slowly pulled over to the shoulder. He pulled up with lights on, stopped then exited the Cruiser and slowly approached me. I already had the window down, license & registration out. His first words were “Do you know how fast you were going?”. Being totally honest (because I had just that second let off the gas) I said “No sir, I have no ideal”. He responded “Well I clocked you at 98 MPH; what is your hurry?”.
Breathed a sigh of relief, because as I recall at the time double the speed limit was criminal. I explained what happened with my car, tried to get it repaired, and to work on time. Of course I was young, 17 or 18 years old; he gave me the “What would I tell your parents and your GF if you killed yourself?” speech. He went back to his car, then approached a few minutes later and said “I’m only going to write you for going over the limit”.
So to answer the question, pull over, that is what you should do.
WARNING! This is VERY spicy!
Yield: 4 servings
Ingredients
Spice Mix
- 2 tablespoons cayenne pepper
- 1 tablespoon paprika
- 1 tablespoon black pepper
- 2 teaspoons garlic powder
- 2 teaspoons onion powder
- 1 teaspoon dried basil
- 1 teaspoon dried oregano
- 1/2 teaspoon chili powder
- 1/8 teaspoon dried thyme
- 1/8 teaspoon dry mustard
Chicken
- 4 (4 ounce) skinless, boneless chicken breast halves
- 2 tablespoons butter, melted
Instructions
Spice Mix
- On a sheet of wax paper, combine cayenne pepper, paprika, black pepper, garlic powder, onion powder, basil, oregano, chili powder, thyme and mustard. Mix well.
Chicken
- Heat a large cast iron skillet or other large heavy skillet over medium-high heat until very hot, about 8 minutes.
- Meanwhile, brush chicken with butter.
- Dredge chicken in spice mixture, patting firmly to adhere.
- Place chicken in prepared skillet and cook, turning once, until coating is blackened and chicken is no longer pink, about 10 minutes.
- Place chicken on a serving platter.
- Serve immediately.
Men Are Waking Up to the CATASTROPHIC Consequences of Marriage
Have you ever seen an employer fire someone without realizing what a crucial role the employee played?
In the early 2000s, my ex-wife was a Senior Systems Analyst for Sears during their long, slow, tailspin into oblivion. At the time, the company was going through one of their perennial desperation moves to stop the bleeding and orders given to slash and burn the employee lists to make the smell less stinky.
She related that during this period, the grim reality was that the employees knew when it was a purge day if they arrived at headquarters in Hoffman Estates, Illinois (USA) and saw a line of taxi cabs waiting at the front door, those being staged for employees who were going to be given the boot and didn’t have transportation out.
Anyway, the bean counters kicked a senior network administrator who had been with the company for many years. He had designed, implemented, and supported a critical software application that had been repeatedly passed over for upgrades and/or replacement because it was still working and alternatives were…. expensive. He was the only one left at the company that actually knew how to run, maintain, and repair this system.
And of course you can see where this is going: some time later, the system in question crashed big-time, nobody had a clue how to fix it, replacing it would take too long (it was critical) and too expensive (they had no money left), so they had to beg and plead for the Net Admin to come back and fix the problem after the guy had demanded and received and agreement that included he be considered a Consultant, higher pay, full medical benefits, and immunity from being let go until they had the system replaced even if he wasn’t working on anything.
They never did get the money together to replace the system, he got a number of years of full-time “cake” money out of it, and the Net Admin was able to get a whole consulting business going out of referrals.
Pizza Delivery Driver 911 Call
What is the most shocked you have been when waking up?
A young lady friend, much older than me, married. She and I were such good friends that even though she was about to be married, she confided in me much that would normally not be confided in someone of the opposite sex. Shortly after she marred she and her new husband did not show up at a family get together on Christmas Day. They did not respond to phone calls. The family went looking for them. As newly weds, they had rented a very small apartment. It had a gas heater. The little apartment was so small that the heater burned up all the oxygen and she was dead. Her face was black, but he was still alive but died on December 31. I was probably 15 years old but my mother opened the door to my room and said “Sharon McBrayer is dead” and left the room. It took me a while to absorb that and go seeking more information.
Why was the concrete made by the Romans more than 2,000 years ago stronger than the one used today?
Roman concrete is like the Chuck Norris of building materials—it’s seriously tough stuff. Even after more than 2,000 years, Roman concrete structures like the Pantheon and aqueducts are still standing strong, making us wonder, “What’s the secret sauce?”
Here’s the lowdown: The Romans made their concrete using a mix of volcanic ash, lime (that’s calcium oxide), and seawater, creating a chemical combo that isn’t just sturdy—it actually gets stronger with time! This ancient recipe produced a material that could resist the elements, especially seawater, which is pretty corrosive.
The magical ingredient in Roman concrete is volcanic ash, which contains silica and alumina. When mixed with lime and seawater, it creates a chemical reaction that forms tobermorite and phillipsite, which are like the superheroes of mineral crystals.
They help the concrete resist cracks and breakage, and they even allow the concrete to “heal” itself, filling in cracks that do form.
Today’s concrete, while super strong and versatile, usually uses Portland cement instead of volcanic ash. It hardens quickly and is great for modern construction, but it doesn’t have the same self-healing properties or resistance to chemical wear and tear. It’s more vulnerable to cracking and doesn’t get better with age like Roman concrete.
So, in a nutshell, Roman concrete is the old-school bodybuilder of building materials—gets better and tougher with age, thanks to some nifty natural chemistry with volcanic ash!
