"There was one dubious study that claimed that $75k maxed out 'happiness'."

Not maxed out, but I think that is about right for the inflection point on the diminishing returns curve.

$50k to $75k was a noticeable bump up in happiness. $75k to $100k was a lesser bump. If I could drop 20% of my salary for 20% less hours I would do it. A massive raise to $200k would have only a minor effect on my happiness, and that would be limited to the extent that it might let me retire sooner.

Note that I live in an area with reasonable housing prices and in a state with no income taxes. The inflection point is not a constant for all circumstances.

Interesting site;

but the best signal is -71 db.

The digital signals don't reach this far (the analog used to), and no cable company serves the area. The only choice is satellite, and both of them are steadily raising prices.

Internet I have. Obviously. Over fiber-optic cable from the local Public Utility District.

As in the kind that are about 5 ft in diameter and bouncing across the road at about 30 mph.

I do hope they have that case in the computer. I'd hate to get a panic-stop reaction or go into the ditch as the computer franticly tries to avoid the "obstruction."

"We already know that using ethanol is a big resource wasing flop, where do you think the ethanol comes from? Yeast and sugar. Going one step up isn't going to help,"

The energy cost of distillation would be avoided with a corn syrup fuel cell. That's worth quite a bit economically.

Figure out how much energy your car uses, then the area of solar panels needed to provide that energy. Then add on the need to use the car during the short cold days of winter.

And you can't use the solar panels to charge the car at night, unless you have another set of batteries to store the energy made by the panels during the day while the car is not there.

You will still be using grid power. Or some liquid or gaseous fuel. With luck you will use less of it than now.

The utility will probably just charge you a fixed connection fee to be on the grid so they get maintenance money regardless of how much power you use. My electric bill is already set up that way. I pay 41 cents a day for that connection fee, and the actual kw-h charge is above that.

"Relativity was posited as a theory over a century ago. How many people truly get it today, in 2014."

As a fraction of the population, I suspect it's about the same as it was then. It's just too counter-intuitive to us slow pokes at less than 1% of c, and the math needed to get past that is beyond most people. I've had math up through diffy-Q, and I can barely manage it. I can get the right answers to textbook questions, but as to really understanding at a deep level what is going on, no.

"I heard the shale oil thing is huge."

Not as big as the promotors would have you believe, but it is certainly significant, and will be for a decade yet. The wells have a high depletion rate, and when they are gone, then ????

The US is only importing 40% of it's oil now, partly due to shale oil, and partly due to lower demand caused by the high prices that make shale oil profitable. That said, when the shale oil promoters show up, keep your hands and your wallet in your pocket.

"Aluminum is a perfectly sound material as long as it's used correctly."

Exactly, so the question is which aluminum alloy are they using. Wikipedia's list is a good place to start on your choices.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aluminium_alloy

My electric bill has two lines, the connection fee ( a straight 41 cents per day) and the actual electrical usage fee.

Clearly the utilities can do it this way, but not all of them do.

"This also would gain California much more influence in the federal government (more senators, more electoral votes)."

Since the reason to split it up is that the different regions can't agree, it seems unlikely their Senators would agree after splitting up. They would likely net out to about the same.

California leaving the union would not end all trade relations with them. If nothing else they will have to keep selling stuff to the rest of the US to pay for their electric bill.

Given they already demand special air quality rules, special water quality rules, and have marked their entire State as carcinogenic, and keep claiming they pay more in taxes than they get back, you would think they would ask to leave.

Stomping off in a huff and shelling a Federal military post on your way out has been previously determined to be not allowable. Asking politely to leave is protected under the First Amendment.

"No comment on whether or not the state of Jefferson would ever be able to support itself without the rest of California,"

Support itself at what level of government meddling? Jefferson probably would not be able to support the level of intrusive and all-encompassing supervision, nor provide the level of financial support to it's citizens that is in vogue at UC Berkeley. But it should be able to provide the level of services that its citizens actually feel they need.

Trivial case, do they need a formal Animal Control Department, or is the shotgun in the closet adequate to the task?

"the point of civilization isn't to protect property but to improve the lives of everyone. That's a fundamental philosophy that a lot disagree with."

I might well disagree, depending on who defines "improve the lives of everyone". The world has plenty of unhappy experience with those who are convinced they can run other peoples lives better than they can.

The House is where population is directly represented. The Senate is where States are directly represented. The Senate was supposed to protect the Sovereignty of States (which function was seriously harmed by the 17th Amendment) and limit the ability of a tyranny of the majority. I.e. the lightly populated states could combine forces to stop a majority in the House, which will inevitably be controlled by the big cities.

The interesting thing at the moment is that the Senate is more controlled by the big cities. (Seattle has two Senators, the rest of Washington gets ignored in that chamber.) Since not all House districts have a major city, they still listen to the countryside on occasion.