The Off Topic Topic

[Habbaku]

DGuller and Habbaku, should I wait for XRP to reach $3 and take my 600% profit or should I wait more/less?

Be happy if it hits $2 and sell everything. 

I am probably just going to hold on until I get stopped out at breakeven.

A fine plan, but why not set your stop somewhere about 10% profit, at least?

[mongers]

The local electricity supply is being repaired tomorrow, so no juice from 8am to when they finish in the late afternoon or evening; so I'm thinking of having a pre-20th century technology day, I have a multi-fuel stove for tea/coffee, don't need the internet or cell-phone for a day, though I may allow myself use of a radio?

Plenty of books, so I don't need to resort to an E-reader.

I'm guessing a trip to the library is allowable, though perhaps supermarkets are out as those are decidedly mid last century onwards.

The sticking point is lighting if it drags on past 5pm, plenty of LED battery lights here, but that's decidedly 21st century, but the alternative is candles, no doubt buried in some draw here about. 

[Oexmelin]

Amazon automatic translation fail:

Quatre-Bras 1815: Last Eagles = Quatre Soutiens-Gorge 1815: Derniers aigles.

[Josquius]

The local electricity supply is being repaired tomorrow, so no juice from 8am to when they finish in the late afternoon or evening; so I'm thinking of having a pre-20th century technology day, I have a multi-fuel stove for tea/coffee, don't need the internet or cell-phone for a day, though I may allow myself use of a radio?

Plenty of books, so I don't need to resort to an E-reader.

I'm guessing a trip to the library is allowable, though perhaps supermarkets are out as those are decidedly mid last century onwards.

The sticking point is lighting if it drags on past 5pm, plenty of LED battery lights here, but that's decidedly 21st century, but the alternative is candles, no doubt buried in some draw here about. 

You may go to the supermarket but you must take your own bag and ask staff members to get things for you to put in it.

And don't forget to wear your leggings.

[crazy canuck]

Amazon automatic translation fail:

Quatre-Bras 1815: Last Eagles = Quatre Soutiens-Gorge 1815: Derniers aigles.

 

[mongers]

You may go to the supermarket but you must take your own bag and ask staff members to get things for you to put in it.

And don't forget to wear your leggings.

 

All and anti-climax, only went off for 6 hours, so didn't get into the swing of things old. 

[Sheilbh]

The old broad is looking good.

Extraordinary achievement - and as Esther Webber notes particularly striking given the state of Parliament another UNESCO World Heritage site (and massive, massive fire hazard):

Esther Webber
@estwebber
When Notre Dame went up in flames, many saw it as a wake-up call for the dire condition of our parliament.

Notre Dame has now been restored and reopened in the time it's taken us to approve, establish and then ditch a plan for restoration - with no way forward currently in place

On the upside, no doubt the next set of plans will include a shed for hypothetical bats

[HVC]

You built an empire, and then decided nothing else must be built. Ever.

[Josquius]

New York City has discovered the concept of bins.
No scribes allowed.

Just read this and was amazed they didn't use bins until now.

https://www.newser.com/story/360180/trash-bins-now-required-for-much-of-new-york-city.html

For half a century, New York City residents have taken out their trash by flinging plastic bags stuffed with stinking garbage straight onto the sidewalk. When the bags inevitably leak or break open, they spill litter into the street, providing smorgasbords for rats. In the winter, the trash mounds get buried in snow and remain frozen in place for days, sometimes weeks, reinforcing the city's reputation as filthy. Now, New Yorkers are slowly adjusting to a radically new routine, at least for America's biggest city: Putting their trash in bins. With lids. In November, covered bins became a requirement for all residential buildings with fewer than 10 living units, the AP reports. That's the majority of residential properties. All city businesses had to start using bins earlier this year.


"I know this must sound absurd to anyone listening to this who lives pretty much in any other city in the world," said Jessica Tisch, the city's former sanitation commissioner, who oversaw the new measures before becoming the city's new police commissioner this week. "But it is revolutionary by New York City's standards because, for 50 years, we have placed all our trash directly on the curbs." The bin requirement, which took effect Nov. 12, comes with its own challenges. Among them: Finding a place for large, wheeled bins in neighborhoods where most buildings don't have yards, alleys, or garages. Landlords and homeowners also have to collect the empty bins and bring them back from the curb in the morning—something you didn't have to do with plastic bags.


In the early 20th century, New York City required trash to be placed in metal cans. But in the era before widespread plastic bag use, refuse was thrown directly into the bins, making them filthy and grimy. Then in 1968, the city's sanitation workers went on strike. For more than a week, trash cans overflowed. Garbage mounds piled high on sidewalks and spilled into the streets like some dystopian nightmare. Plastic bag makers donated thousands of bags to help clean up the mess, and New Yorkers never looked back, said Steven Cohen, a Columbia University dean specializing in public affairs. "It had to do with convenience," he said. "After the strike, the sanitation workers preferred the modern advance of lighter and seemingly cleaner sealed plastic bags."

story continues below
 
But Democratic Mayor Eric Adams' administration has deemed trash bag mounds Public Enemy No. 1 in his well-documented war against the city's notorious rats, which have little problem getting into a plastic bag. Still, not all residents are convinced. Caitlin Leffel, who lives in Manhattan, said residents of her building had to hire someone "at surprisingly high cost" to bring out the bins the night before and bring them back in. Eventually, the largest residential buildings—those with more than 31 units—will have their own designated container on the street. New trash trucks built with automated, side-loading arms—another innovation that is already common in many other locales—will then clear them out. Fines ranging from $50 to $200 will kick in Jan. 2

[Sheilbh]

You built an empire, and then decided nothing else must be built. Ever.

In all seriousness I do find this striking when there's been some decisions to block projects because of the impact on Victorian built heritage. Because they're a complex bunch, but I can't imagine a society more indifferent to the claims of the past on the present than the Victorians (albeit normally creating something radically, violently new and dressing it up in Medieval costume). They tore anything down if necessary to build a railway, that viaduct, that reservoir etc - which shapes why we have the cities we do to this day. On the one hand that spirit (which I think carries on into the early-to-mid twentieth century of building the future) is why we've now ended up so restricted, but on the other I sort of admire it and think we've maybe swung a bit too far.