That's literally true -- as I recall, there was a study that found about 70% of the time, dogs signal in accord with the handler's expectations, rather than per what they actually found (or didn't find).

Speaking as a pro dog trainer, I don't find this the least bit remarkable. Dogs suitable for advanced training want to please their handlers. Theit handlers want to find drugs. QED.

What state are you in? Always good to know which actually have heard of the Constitution.

A few more direct from China:

http://www.alibaba.com/trade/search?fsb=y&IndexArea=product_en&CatId=&SearchText=7+inch+tablet

Mostly these are bulk sales only, but a few will sell individual units. (And I don't know what shipping from China costs, but I've bought small electronics, phone chargers and the like, from Hong Kong that were under $5 =including= shipping.)

BTW according to inside info from Apple, as of a couple years ago the actual cost to make an iPad in China was $38. (And would have been all of $6 more if made in USA.)

I don't doubt there have always been the occasional tamed and made-a-pet cat, more or fewer depending on the culture (as someone pointed out re ancient Egypt). But on the whole, you're right -- in fact it's only been the last 50 years or so in the American farming midwest that more than the occasional kitten was made into a pet. The vast majority worked for a living, in the barns and fields, and unless tamed young, yeah, they're NOT pets, nor can most be made into pets later.

Conversely, most dogs that are not handled young still act like dogs, not like wolves.

Back about 1980 I had one that spent all day every day hunting gophers, and was so good at it that he completely exterminated them within about half a mile of my rural house, and so thoroughly that after the cat died, it was a good three years before I saw another gopher. (Prior to this cat, they'd been thick as plague.)

Conversely, once I came home after being gone for a week, and here's three lazy cats in the house watching a mouse sitting in the middle of the floor, but none could be arsed to get off their comfy couch... and all the cat food was in the kitchen drawers, where it had been stashed by mice in my absence. Two of these were good hunters outdoors, but apparently indoor mice were 'pets'.

I once had a cat that was freakish smart (on a par with an average dog). This first became evident when one day I was hiding behind a box and using a 'fishing line' to play with the feral kittens. All but one chased the string in the usual way. The freak looked at the string, looked UP the string, then jumped over the box to grab my hand. (Which is exactly what average puppies will do.) This cat later became a house pet... which gave me opportunity to watch him with mirrors. The other cats thought something they saw in the mirror was IN the mirror. But the freak would immediately look over his shoulder at whatever had just appeared in the mirror. He had all manner of freak-thinking behaviors I've never seen in another cat. (Incidentally, he was a hermaphrodite -- born female, developed male genitals at about 3 months. And was the product of 4 generations of inbreeding down from one female, which I only knew because the feral colony there was small and isolated.)

More typical, tho, were my feral barn kittens... I'd bang the dish on the concrete to call them for breakfast. And if after a couple days I then held the dish out of their reach, rather than looking up like "Hey, where's my dish?" like a puppy will, the kittens tried to eat the concrete floor. I wish I had video; it was hysterical. And a good demonstration of how dumb most cats really are -- tho they *condition* so rapidly that they appear 'smart'.

[I'm a pro dog trainer, but I usually also have several cats.]

"And as for efficiency - the heat a bulb generates is not wasted at all in houses with the heating turned on."

Exactly. I've made this point before and been shouted down.

One very common use of incandescent bulbs in the farming midwest is as a cheap way to heat a pumphouse or chicken coop during the winter. A 100w bulb can keep that small space as warm as it needs to be (ie. a little above freezing), and you get light as a bonus (chickens need light in winter anyway, if they're to keep producing eggs). The alternatives do not save energy; if anything, they use more: the only viable alternative is space heaters, the lowest wattage I've ever seen being 500w, and most do not have a thermostat setting as low as the heat output of a 100W bulb (the best I've seen comes on at 55F)... so you're forced to keep the space warmer than necessary, a waste of energy.

Is it wrong that I have a 3GHz machine whose only task is to play DOOM? :D

Spring of 1994, I bought a new computer that came with a bootleg copy (full version) of DOOM. I soon bought copies of every edition I could lay hands on. From that bootleg they sold a dozen full retail games to me (including DOOM3, even tho I didn't like it enough to play it). Goes to show what being worth the money does for ya.

I'm wondering why it's not a function of tire slip vs distance traveled. If your GPS says you traveled further than your tires rotated, you're on a slippery surface and need to change driving tactics. Notify once, not constantly. Or turn on a dash icon. (Or leave me the hell alone; I learned to drive under such conditions and I can figure it out myself, thanks very much.)

As to cold being a factor... ice at -40 is not slippery; it can be downright sticky.

As someone's tagline hereabouts says, "I don't have a problem with God; it's his cheerleaders I can't stand." :)

And technically, aren't the Ten Commandments a Hebrew/Jewish thing, not of Christian origin?

I think you are right. These idiots won't listen to science, and they won't even listen to the illness or deaths of their own children, because they'll find something else to blame. But being made to feel uncool, seriously, I think that's likely to have more of an influence. :(

BTW we've got the same anti-vac idiocy and then some among dog owners. Parvovirus, distemper, and lepto are all making gleeful comebacks. :(

And this is interesting:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tetanus#Neonatal_tetanus

[I just had a booster, along with the other gaggle of vaccines for old farts.... and lived!]

I haven't looked into HepB vaccine specifically, but -- if a virus is slow-replicating, and you're given vaccine at the time of exposure, the vaccine can generate enough antibodies that the virus can't get a foothold, thus preventing infective exposure from becoming full infection.