There are different ways to measure big buildings, but pretty much none of them are banks. You can measure volume, footprint, floor space, etc. Some of the largest buildings are airplane factories, retail warehouses, airports, and an apparently impressive flower auction house in Holland. I guess those bulbs had a lasting effect after all!

You don't have to brick it. Other countries use a blacklist of IMEI numbers. Phone theft has decreased because stolen phones won't be able to connect to any mobile networks. Yeah, there are various workarounds and hacks but it's not intended to stop smart people.

Your casual dismissal of this possibility seems logical but is incorrect. There are numerous studies of cross resistance between triclosan and antibiotics, Here is one showing several bacteria that evolve resistance to antibiotics after being exposed to sublethal doses of triclosan. This implies that dosing our wastewater with low levels of triclosan is reckless and had better have strong evidence that it does some good. It is definitely doing some bad!

Can't jump off the bridge once they put up the net

The people I've discussed it with tend to not think of it as a religion, more like ceremonial rituals done out of respect for their ancestry. Perfect example is a bar mitzvah where the reading is done phonetically, without really learning the words. Morality is seen as having murky roots in Jewish faith, but open for analysis and largely based on logic. I find a lot of common ground with these types of people, I acknowledge that my personal ethical sense is entwined with the cultural and religious environment I was raised in but I don't believe any of the religious particulars.

A lot of reform Jews treat it as a cultural heritage, think of it as being Polish or British or something. Some people are more into it than others, and a lot of Jews have fond memories and lots of relatives with these shared cultural experiences so it is important for them to share with their children but it isn't a fierce religious calling.

You shouldn't let it bother you. Lots of people don't particularly care about their ancestors' rituals, even if they think it is fun to play along sometimes.

The button is for thrifty people who want to get their moneys worth out of their tires. When you're about to get a new set of tires you do burnouts in the tire store parking lot until metal is showing, rotate the tires and repeat. Then proudly pull in to the service bay with absolutely no tread left on any of your tires.

I do wear glasses. I'm a cheap bastard so I generally buy from a place that sells an eye exam, regular glasses, and sunglasses for $99 if you can live with the frames they offer. If you pick nicer frames the price goes up, I usually get out of there for $150. I bought a pair of prescription polarized sunglasses years ago for $200 and I still use them, I treat them tenderly always keeping them in a hard case when I'm not wearing them. When I'm staring into bright water or road having an out of date prescription isn't very noticeable.

For swimming, I buy "off the shelf" prescription goggles for $20. They don't match my eyes perfectly, but at least I can walk around without banging into anything and I don't crash into stuff in the water. My eyes require different strength lenses, so I buy 2 pair and cannibalize them to make 2 custom pair that sorta fit my eyes.

If you have a current prescription you can shop online, there are some good deals out there.

If bright glare bothers you, do yourself a favor and invest in the polarized lenses. I've got pretty sensitive eyes and it's been totally worth it for me.

Pay the PR company to spiff up your competition's page(s) and they get punished.

top 1% earn >$394k. That's 5 and a half Tesla Model S per year.

Anyone making that kind of money could afford a Tesla if that was their priority.

The US Fire Administration collects detailed statistics. You can check out the latest report Here

There are 7% categorized as intentional, with an additional 10% as under investigation, which may have some convincing arsons.

Back in the 50s tons of people took amphetamines for extra pep or to lose a few pounds. Many millions of people took them moderately. The addiction potential was there, but you didn't see the horrible social effects until the legal source dried up and bikers started selling crank.

I don't think a restaurant has to care about their website to have good food. Some of my favorite restaurants don't have a website. They don't need one. Many others have a rudimentary one their nephew made in the 90s and it has never been updated.

Sure, there are many restaurants that care way more about marketing than anything else, and they should have a truly world class website.

I understand hating the built in viewers, but to me they are a blessing. There are so many things that are PDFs for no reason. I really appreciate a quick and dirty way to see PDFs, and with my usage it is good enough 90% of the time. For the interactive ones etc. I tend to recognize which ones aren't going to work so I just download the file. On unfamiliar systems I always grit my teeth when clicking a link causes a 20 second delay while Adobe Viewer lurches from the shadows and demands to be updated.

Unhealthy people do have an effect on others. I'm surprised rich self reliant types haven't figured this out yet.

If you have a pool of unvaccinated measles carriers, that affects even healthy vaccinated people. Same with a bunch of antibiotic resistant TB carriers. It's in everyone's interest to avoid having seas of badly treated disease carriers mingling with the elite.