“Liberty means responsibility. That is why most men dread it.”
“Progress is impossible without change, and those who cannot change their minds cannot change anything.”
-George Bernard Shaw
There doesn’t seem to be as much overflowing into non political communities here as at reddit where it’s just overflowing everywhere I find. I think it’s a reflecting of the anxiety many are feeling about the election. Hopefully it dies down in a couple of weeks.
When was Times Square rejuvenated? Was it during his watch?
I had read at some point after WW2 Times Sqaure slipped into seedy and run down with building owners on the brink of bankruptcy before efforts were made to reclaim the area from the places that were not desirable.
I wonder if he had any role in that?
Lol love that one. My uncle was the one that used the Bullshit line on me
Don’t try to bullshit me, I’m a bullshit artist.
I’ve been fortunate to spend some time traveling down the west coast and into the south west then to the east of the US. I’ve also been lucky enough to travel through the west to the east in both Canada and the US too. Outside of New York I’ve not really made it to the east coast though.
Big differences are in some areas like city versus rural but as others have stated the borders don’t mean as much of a difference like opposite coasts within a country does. Geography certainly does seem to be more important.
Provincial /State boundaries can be a difference in some cases but more for the big cities versus the rural areas that share the borders.
Like the US in Canada the divide is often rural versus city, then primary industries beyond the French vs the English.
One big difference I did pick up in my US business trips is for large factories or businesses to be located in small town USA when in Canada the city centers would be the normal place for those types of industry. The rural Canadian areas are much more reliant on resource harvesting and tourism. They often hold their nose about tourism in some cases as a necessary evil. They really don’t want hordes coming to ruin it all.
I will say the absolute vastness of the US southwest made me realize there’s a lot of territory to try to unit and it’s a bigger job in the US with the sheer numbers and then the differences being boiled down to 2 major groups politically that have a real say.
In Canada we have 5 main political parties and then on the provincal level they can be pretty different from each other. Eventually we will end up with just 2 parties with enough elections but that will not be in my lifetime thankfully.
I think the biggest things for me are the terror of the US gun violence that just seems to be waiting around every corner depending on who you talk to or the need to gather arms to take on the government is a daily need. I’ve seen just a few packing weapons and I’m not sure I trust their ability to be a good guy if the need was to arise.
Unfortunately the mass shootings daily in the US are the few times a week reality and are pretty great for gun sales I suspect. Then followed by being bankrupted by US health insurance costs or a lack of it and being ill in the US system. The cost of drugs seems pretty insane too.
I’ll take the feelings of mostly being safe in Canada but others would disagree with this much like many would say the same thing about violence in Mexico. Canadian Healthcare is slow but you won’t be financially ruined by it yet.
Media is pretty different depending on your leanings. We can be pretty overpowered by the US media machine. Canadians can often know more general info than Americans about their own country and history at times. Canadians struggle to know more about Canadian history than US history.
The rage filled entertainment news of the US is not as common here but we get so much of a diet of US media our folks at times will parrot the same US talking points without realizing it doesn’t apply to many Canadian situations. When the vaccine objectors started protesting, they were fighting for US constitutional rights within Canada. They didn’t understand the right for Manitoba to join Canada wasn’t the same right as the US’s declarations.
Unfortunately these idiots have taken on flying Canadian flags all the time like our US cousins, becoming a hijack of our reserved flag waving as their identity. It’s ruined the previous typical flag waving we would do for Canada day and sporting events. We are not at nationalist as our southern neighbours. The rest of us look at these idiots with disdain and do not want to be associated with them. It’s almost at the same level as those that fly rebel flags in the US.
I’ve been fortunate to meet some wonderful people in Canada, Mexico, and the US. The geography of these countries can be quite stunning in areas without a doubt.
There are many differences but there are great similarites on a individual level. To paraphrase what George Carlin said, people individually can be fantastic but it’s a problem when they start to group up and when it’s 2 3 7 10 14 then you can start to get real problems.
It’s a shame so much time has passed for the public to even recall how much Teddy fought for the average Joe blow public with his first deal. He fought the corporate overloads and they couldn’t believe he couldn’t be bribed like those before him and since.
The things that will destroy America are prosperity-at-any-price, peace-at-any-price, safety-first instead of duty-first, the love of soft living, and the get-rich-quick theory of life. -Theodore Roosevelt
When I was younger I just put a chunk of foam at the end of my regular mattress to make up the gap.
In the last couple of years a it’s custom made foam sheets with latex. Not cheap but possible from local foam shops or upholstery shops.
You can also find smaller traditional mattress manufacturers too but it’s not cheap but it’s still an option.
A Maple Bed frame that was custom made for me by a relative woodworker. It’s longer for my height.
It seems to also be a switching task issue in our minds. These changes of states takes more effort than playing the next video does or just keeping on what we are doing. It’s so much easier for us to keep playing the digital dopamine slot machine that, TikTok, instagram reels, Facebook and YouTube short videos provide.
From a business sense they want to keep your attention, from a biology sense we are safe and don’t see a need to move with the random rewards another quick video offers.
It’s amazing how well they have refined getting and keeping our attention. We also get rewarded with dopamine from the anticipation of the next story or short video. It gets we don’t even really need the next video, just the anticipation is enough to reward us with more dopamine.
I’ve read doing a simple reverse mental countdown of 5-4-3-2-1 blast off helps us switch gears from another part of the brain. It can also help us get out of bed or off the couch.
It’s funny no matter which side we are coming from we rarely get checked on our views in our social media curated echo chambers.
In the old days we would have been pulled more to the center due to most people in real life being a little left or right of it.
I still think many really are but that doesn’t sell ads or moves people to vote like what about them outrage or think of the children boogie men do. It’s a shame how polarized we’ve become.
I would have thought they of all people would have learned about line extension and how great New Coke turned out for them
The gf’s father is like this. Every visit is a story of some famous or rich person/people he spent the day with as a buddy not an employee of, or the more common one of his outage and how he one upped someone or put a group of people in their place, at least in his story.
Then he wonders why his son doesn’t want to deal with him, while I see his adult son being a outrage clone of him in a way with stories of injustices against him. His rage is simmering as he tells the stories about every employer, coworker, supervisor, or government agency that is wrong or out to get him. Lately it’s been how the school teachers are plain wrong when it comes to how much of a pain his son is becoming and how his lectures of these elementary teachers is going.
In relation miss my late father’s stories of how much the little town I grew up had changed since my last visit which was often the same stories or my other family members do nothing stories that never change either. The energy level of that is pretty low looking back now…
I seem to get the version on how wasted they got and sick they were afterwards. It’s like they unlock new achievement badges each weekend by how much they throw up the next day.
I’m left thinking you’re getting into your late 30s or 40s now. This isn’t your teens and early 20s anymore.
I’ve enjoyed when seeing some of these hard partiers mature and nope out now after a few years. But honestly being a alcoholic seems to the baseline starting place for many when it comes to socializing.
I know I’m a drag for them when I’m at a nice hotel and I’m not joining in with a cooler bag full of beers or hard stuff to get the party started before going to dinner. The gf is younger and a little frustrated I’m just not interested in that anymore or was I ever really.
She’s coming to terms with her inability to not be sick after a night of drinking as she gets older now too. Being health conscious she’s coming to the realization that alcohol consumption is perhaps not the best thing for her long term either based on the health of her long term friends still trying to keep up with being wasted every weekend.
Mostly the same here with NPR and the Economist thrown in.
I’ve not really watched much of Bob’s Burgers but I think I saw a fan made cross over sometime back and it was weird for sure.
Just into season 7.
A lot of great shows mentioned. To add to the list of upbeat the gf and I are working our way through Modern Family. The early seasons are pretty upbeat and lighthearted. I do wonder where they will end up in the later seasons as the families age.
Working Moms is something the gf watches and what I’ve seen had been pretty great and has some good fun shock value. I’m surprised where they go with some of the humour. Usually only animated shows get away with this.
I would add Archer but I haven’t finished the last couple of seasons so I’m not sure where it ends up on the fun and outrageous scale.
Loved this show. Wish there was more.
I’m quite enjoying it too but I think it borders on horror with the themes of where the modern world will end up.
Depends on if it is still using USB 2.0 or 3.0+ standard for data transfer. I love the mostly plug it in way you like option Ivey micro usb, but trying to do photo file transfers from older/cheaper USB C with 2.0 is brutally slow if needed.