Thank you for making this point. I still shoot on film from time to time (at least a few rolls a year, so not much, admittedly). The truth is that the resolution of film is at a molecular level, which makes it a little tougher to work with, but especially gratifying when you get the result you want. Until we have sensors that can detect at molecular resolutions, there won't be true equivalence. That said, with digital pictures, it's positively amazing how easy it is to repair poor exposures and make enhancements that used to take me hours to do under the enlarger, monkeying around with papers and chemistry. That pregnant period of creation, or just the delay in processing, isn't so bad. The results, because you have to wait, are more exciting to me in a kind of christmas morning kind of way. I've also been enjoying my polaroid cameras a lot more than I did when polaroid was making the film. The impossible project has furnished some really interesting small-batch boutique films that polaroid would not have accepted, but which have wonderful character. I never used to be able to find black & white polaroid films back in the day, anyway, and it's been a real pleasure to take those pictures. Film isn't dead, thankfully. I'm not ready to give it up, regardless.

Excellent point. Thanks for making it.

Perhaps such an approach could offer more broad-spectrum immunity, but you're still looking at over 200 strains of rhinovirus and coronavirus, and they evolve. What's more, immunity by catching them in the wild isn't necessarily permanent. It was a long time back, but I do recall that the normal person only catches maybe 30-50 different strains of the common cold viruses over a lifetime, and that there are geographic differences in what strains are common in the wild. You may rarely get colds in Georgia, but there are different beasties in Idaho that might really set you back if you came across them. Getting sick with one strain might mean that you gain some resistance to other related strains, but how to know which ones? Would one even notice any differences? Maybe targeted baseline immunization of virus families would help reduce the symptoms and duration of infection, but there are still the secondary infections (some of which can be very serious) to worry about. My point is that while we might be able to make the square more circle-ish, I doubt that we can really get rid of the common cold. I do like where you're going with the idea, though. We'll see what happens.

The skin also needs to be stain-resistant and washable. Yes. I said it. You can't un-read it.

Agree 100%. Most of the background in the book was there simply to let the reader know that there was a background -- to put the story in a larger context that you didn't need to know everything about.

Agreed. Two would have been enough. Tolkein wrote it as a standalone story in one volume. It doesn't need anything else. I think PJ is starting to like the smell of his own flatus so much that he doesn't want to stop eating beans, so to speak.

I think the current world record is 66, held by some guy in Norway. It might be hard to get advice from him, though. I think he's in a hospital, of all places.

The government cannot tell me that I can afford it, and they couldn't fine me. I'd be off to jail."

There is no "off to jail" in the ACA.

You'd be asked to prove that you did not have enough money to afford a plan on the exchange, then you would fall under medicaid (poverty proven, by then) and then you would pay a subsidized rate. As long as you don't opt out of carrying insurance at all, there is no "fine" or tax penalty.

I commend you, sir. You have hit the nail squarely on the head. If I had the points, I'd mod you insightful.

"that's precisely what this law is: a government mandated fee (NOT a tax, that's also BS) for simply being alive."

Yes, it's a fee. It's a fee for a financial risk-mitigating service. It's also a fee I've been paying (in the form of higher premiums) for people who want to be alive and not pay their own bills for the services (in the emergency room, of all places) of people who keep them alive, working, having bratty kids, etc. It's also a fee that I've been paying for people who don't have the good sense to get regular medical checkups and screenings at a clinic pr Dr's office when they're well, so that their chronic diseases can be managed such that they don't have to go to the emergency room and be admitted to treat conditions that could have been prevented or controlled.

As it happens, I pay other fees for other people to be alive (for water treatment and sewer service, for public schools, for bridges and infrastructure, for firefighting coverage), but I get to share in those benefits, too, so these are fees that I pay in the form of taxes, because the good is public.

I'm quite tired of having me and every other insured person having to foot the bill so that libertarians and objectivists can enjoy some kind of idealistic existence.

I met a guy, a guy who owned his own construction business, who refused to get health insurance. He always went to the ER when he was sick, and only when he was very sick or injured. Never paid a single medical bill. He had a really nice power boat -- a big cabin cruiser. I asked him why he didn't buy insurance and he said that he could not afford to carry it for his company, and that even if he could afford it, he had concluded that he would only end up paying more than he would get out of it, should he have to rely on it. If he was deathly sick or fatally injured, nobody was going to be able to make him pay when he was dead. He said that by not paying a bill he didn't have to pay it permitted him more money to do things he liked -- like his boat. I said, "so, because I pay my insurance, you got free health care and also that boat." and he looked me straight in the eye and said "yeah, exactly".

Now that guy has to pay -=something=-, and I feel a little better about having to share air with him.

Thankfully, I have Microcenter in my city.

I agree completely. I liken Ron Paul to Pat Buchanan. He'll start talking and he says something that makes sense, and then he keeps talking and you begin to realize just how crazy and idiotic he really is. I actually believe that Ron Paul is bat-poop insane.

I bought 2 GE CF bulbs back in the mid-90s, these were the super-bright ones (equivalent, they said with a 100W), and one of them is still going strong as my back porch light.

The radio series "This American Life" did a story about a guy who traveled to India and lost his marbles on Mefloquine. Look for "Contents Unknown".

Sometimes you get a bad salesperson, but the folks at microcenter are the best-informed and knowledgeable people about computer parts and tech stuff out of any brick & mortar store. Yes, they will try to sell you, but you're not forced to buy anything, and I've never really been pressured on anything I've been shopping for. They also know the store very well, and can save you time hunting around for stuff. You can use salespeople to your advantage, you know. What do you care if they sticker your stuff, anyway? It doesn't raise the price, and they get credit for being helpful. On the flip side, salespeople who want to get credit for a sale they had no part in are being unethical and it's okay to report that to management.