If those are valid substitutes for prison and they do exist, then why does prison still get the bulk of the offenders? I’m all for your idea but reality seems to be proving those solutions do not apply to most cases of criminal justice

It’s easier and less stressful for me to vote in person. My polling place is like a two block walk and there’s rarely a line, plus I know there’s no room for shenanigans to disenfranchise me.

Mail in voting seems more complicated, although my state mails them out by default and it’s probably just lack of familiarity. Anyway, in person is easy and pleasant so I don’t see any reason to change.

I don’t know if I’d need to buy stamps but I’m already late for my new lawn care guy because he insists I need to mail him a check but I haven’t had stamps in years and he’s about the only check I write

This year is the first time it’s complicated though. My older kid is voting for the first time and I want to vote with him for that milestone. He’s at college but didn’t follow up with mail in voting so we have to figure out the logistics of getting him home on a school/work day

Yeah my nostalgia food is Kraft mac&cheese. It always tastes amazing as it reminds me of my childhood …… but i try to rarely have it

Somewhat the opposite.

• I seem to be the only one here who likes Bisquick pancakes, at least as a starting point (I usually add something: last time it was half a can of pumpkin, walnuts and pie spices)
• I find frozen meatballs significantly worse than hand made, plus there’s usually a lot of junk ingredients. However realistically that usually means I’ll Use sausage or shredded chicken thighs

It does make a huge difference to have a decent mix and Bisquick isn’t filled with all the crap of a standard mix. But remember Bisquick isn’t really a pancake mix: it’s a baking convenience combining a handful of common ingredients in common proportions. If you don’t want the convenience, do it yourself. It doesn’t really even take more time but you have to have the ingredients on hand.

While I like the flatter style pancakes, if you want fluffier, thicker, make some bacon. Seriously, if you give a little time for the mix to do its thing, Bisquick will fluff right up. Make the mix, cook some bacon, put the pancakes on: bingo, fluffy pancakes

On days when I feel like this, the two most important pieces of equipment are a rice maker and an air fryer. Now I can have chicken breasts over rice at the touch of a few buttons.

• take a look at how much sodium too much instant rice has, plus it’s overly processed to make it quick. With the rice maker it might take 15-20 minutes but all I do is pour rice and water in and press the button…. Much better than instant and no sodium. This is what converted me from a potato guy to a rice guy.

• air fryer gets a bad rep because it’s only the chicken tenders and fries labeled with directions, but it does a great job with chicken breasts or thighs - just press the button and wait for it to ding!

No, it’s really not. If you read the label you might be surprised how often just one meal puts you over your max recommended daily amount, and by how far.

Excessive sodium has a much stronger and well proven connection to health problems and early death than most of the other crud in boxed slop

If a lasagna is more effort than you want to put in, there are lots of recipes for “deconstructed” lasagna, so you can make it yourself much easier!

I thought I read about this for real a while back? In a bid to make plastic decay faster, make it out of cellulose with embedded bacteria that can break it down. It still happens too slowly for most plastic packaging

I used to work with a Millie - it was difficult to resolve such a cute name with such a competent engineer. Maybe it shows my biases but I feel like she had to overcome her name

My corp has been very skeptical and suspicious. So far the only allowed ai is to summarize slack. For channels that I want to keep in the loop but not waste time monitoring, it creates a nice summary of recent traffic.

I was trying to help one guy who used an online ai despite it being against policy. However he was just using it as a search engine to find a code solution and it took way too long to give him the wrong answer. A search engine would have been faster but he’d have to use his own judgement to identify the wrong answer. Pretty arrogant guy despite not knowing what he was doing, so I didn’t fight it when he insisted he was going to follow what it told him

Wait until your furnace dies and see if it was closer to ten years or to 25 years?

Add up your maintenance costs over the life of the furnace and decide whether your actions could have saved enough money to change your behavior?

But seriously I’m not sure there is a clear provable answer until it happens, and even then ….

…… so for me, I tend to look at how expensive it would be to replace the furnace and decide to do everything I can to extend its life

Right it’s just an electric resistive heater in a radiator shape filled with an oil to circulate heat.

• no combustion
• no hot surfaces
• more consistent heat
• generally more engineered for continuous use than other space heaters
• generally have tip sensors (depending on country)

When my ex wanted a space heater, I insisted that this be the only type, for safety. And of course not allowed to use a power strip or extension cord with it

I’m not sure that flies for boomers. That’s the X’ers: my adult life pretty much matches the history of PCs, so I better know how to use them.

However my parents were older when PCs appeared, and at the time there seemed no reason to learn about them. Ok, my Dad was an engineer who built them, but my Mom never had any reason to use a computer until the Facebook era, when lots of regular people started to use email. It was still quite common at the time for adults to not see a purpose, so I give boomers a pass

As a US user, with a bit of an organization compulsion, I do wish it was a little more structured.

The problem is not that community x is us-centric, but that it’s not called x.us

In some states

I really don’t think people have thought this through. Every current attempt at this has been small and cheap, but this bulky monstrosity would be ugly and expensive.

Personally I hope for mainly a software solution over a cheap/old iPad. Maybe a bigger but cheaper screen. Where’s my family calendar, my photo album, my Weasley clock, my home dashboard and controls, my activity trends? How about a video doorbell where the picture pops up quickly enough to be useful? There have been attempts at this but not any that work well within the Apple ecosystem.

We don’t need another “Amazon Echo Show” and sitting at the table for a video call is not going to happen, we need an appliance for people to manage their lives with

That’s where my hope is: they’re no trump. While I have no idea how trump attracts any voters, I can see the reality that these guys attract far less, and owe their prominence partly to trump. I’m much more confident they can’t succeed, and that’s when it all falls apart. After that disastrous run, Republicans have the opportunity to prevail. Will democracy, morals, a guiding philosophy prevail, or just another shit show?

There is no “vote blue, no matter who”. There is “vote against fascism”, plus many of us like the blue candidate.

I’m all for your goal of two sane candidates, one blue and one progressive, and will be very happy to join that debate. Let’s get there first

Clearly written by someone without much tree cover. If I didn’t clear my leaves, by spring the grass would be gone, replaced with slimy black mold. Bad idea.

That being said my town collects leaves for compost, and I usually use the mulching mower on the last few weeks. Nothing wasted, no pollution, some nutrients put back, and I don’t have to wade through knee deep leaves, or suffer mold allergies in the spring.

Note, decaying leaves tend to be acidic, so check your lawn ph and be prepared to add lime