The article should have clarified that 417 million microbeads are, assuming the diameter of microbead is 0.2 millimeter, less than 400 liters, or approximately 100 gallons.

Less than four liters, not 400 liters.

He wants a phone that can't understand the meaning of "closest to".

Sudden, indeed.

a few quick calculations show that this particular area has caused a sea level rise of ~1/7th of a millimeter per year recently.

So, if it keeps up for the next seven thousand years, we'll see a meter of sea-level rise.

Color me unworried at the possibility that the ocean might be half an inch deeper by 2100....

But I don't think, such use makes them officially "hammers" and "anvils"

Hammer == rock you hit other rocks with.

Anvil == rock you hit with a hammer....

In other words, they found some rocks that were banged together. which is nice, but it's not the same as "tools". They MAY be tools. Or not. It would be nice to hear about some evidence they were DESIGNED for some particular purpose. Other than banging on some other rock.

What? You object to my parents/siblings keeping their secret ballots secret?

Or do you just object to them not brainwashing me to believe exactly the same things they believe?

You mean Phobos and Deimos are also made of cheese?

Currently, Oregon has a $0.30 per gallon fuel tax. Plus conversion factors for unusual fuels.

This $0.015/mile tax is equivalent, therefore, to the rate you'd be paying if your car got 20 mpg.

So the volunteers will come out ahead if they have gas-guzzlers, and way behind if they have even reasonably fuel efficient vehicles.

And in exchange for higher taxes on driving, they get the privilege of providing Oregon information on how much they travel and WHERE THEY TRAVEL.

What could possibly go wrong with this idea?

Since 1978, utilities have been obligated to purchase electricity from qualified facilities (QFs) under a law called PURPA. Net Metering isn't a federal requirement, but PURPA sure as heck is.

Note that what makes a "qualified facility" is that the price of electricity purchased from one must be LOWER than the cost to produce the electricity by the utility.

Which means that they're only required to buy the electricity if not doing so would increase the cost of electricity to their customers.

So, no, net metering isn't required. They're not even required to pay you as much as their own wholesale rates, though they probably would....

from several criminal practices, including avoiding taxes

"Avoiding" taxes is NOT a crime. "Evading" taxes IS a crime.

I have never known a woman that was into comics

**points at wife and daughter** I know two....

You jest, but I was in high school before there were TRS-80's. The TRS-80 hit the streets about the time I was graduating....

It's been pretty much normal since FDR's day for young people to (tend to) vote Democrat and older people to (tend to) vote Republican.

And yet the Republican Party hasn't disappeared. Probably because some of those young D's eventually grow up to be old R's.

Note that the reasons for that transition are manifold, but I suspect largely a matter of the definition of "conservative" and "liberal" (which definitions have been shifting as time passes - what is "liberal" today will be "normal" tomorrow and "conservative" the day after).

I was born and raised republican

Interesting. My parents never talked politics. They never mentioned who they were voting for. Or even IF they were voting.

Come to that, I have no idea at all who my siblings vote for now, or even if they vote.

And I'm none too sure who my wife and child vote for, or if they vote....

Examples that NASA has something to do with (maybe not directly): the microwave, 0-G ball pen, tennis shes, freeze dried ice cream.

Tennis shes? Pretty sure women were playing tennis long before NASA came along....