I learned today that there is a full-service gas station on my way to/from work. I didn't know we had any of those locally. It's been years (probably decades); what is the conventional tip ( Read more... )

This Shabbat we had a guest, Ruth Messinger from American World Jewish ServiceShe spoke Friday night about global communities and led a study ( Read more... )

Maritan Headsets (from Joel on Software) is a long but worthwhile article ( Read more... )

Words that are often misused #1: "periodic". To be meaningful, this word needs to be accompanied by some indication of the period. "Daily" is "periodic", but probably not what is meant in a recipe's direction to "stir periodically ( Read more... )

My mother-in-law's seder has some singing, but mostly in Yiddish ( Read more... )

Yesterday I got a statement from my credit-card company. It was a transaction summary for 2005; I've never seen this sort of thing before. The front page informed me that last year I spent $X on food, $Y on entertainment, $Z on professional services, and so on for about 15 broad categories. That's the sort of thing that could be useful if you ( Read more... )

I'm not fanatical about grocery coupons, because my time is valuable too. I clip (well, tear) coupons for things I buy regularly or things with big-enough payoffs that I might plausibly buy before they expire. A speculative 20-cents-off coupon isn't worth my hassle. On average, I use about half a dozen coupons in a typical shopping trip ( Read more... )

Last night's episode of 24 really triggered the "if I were the evil overlord and my enemy had delivered himself into my hands I'd just shoot him" reflex. I'm just saying ( Read more... )

A few weeks ago sekhmets_song posted a poll asking "What do you see as the most fundamental political issue?", with options like "education", "religion", "gender identity", and others. profane_stencil posted the same poll. In both cases the most popular answer was "class".
I, on the other hand, feel that the most significant political issue ( Read more... )

Automated alternatives to humans in the service industry ( Read more... )