HankStrong

I was there. It was worse in person.

Is it weird that I have an ALDI quarter in my truck? That's the only piece of change I have. Also, I'm not above putting my quarter back in my pocket and taking someone else's quarter if I see a cart in the lot. I also hate that companies feel the need for me to have 8,000 apps on my phone. Just stop already. I seriously don't need an individual app for every single transaction I make. Story time. The weekend before last I went to a fundraising event that happened to have a cash bar in the banquet room. I walked up, ordered a drink, and got out my phone to pay. He said they didn't take e-payments. That's fine, it's sort of new-ish (vaguely) technology that not every place has. I put my phone away and pulled out my credit card. He shook his head and said it was called a CASH BAR for a reason, because you had to pay cash. Technically, it does have the word cash in the name, but that's to tell you that you don't get free drinks included with your event. As I carry exactly zero dollars in my wallet, I was not drinking that night. I did leave extra early to make up for it.

35 political threads and growing. I feel like an 80s McDonald's sign. But I like your info about Lake Nona Medical City.

In my train thread I talked a little about how Phoenix is repurposing a few old malls/shopping centers into hubs for transit along stops in the system. They are using the ample parking, general convenience, and former storefronts by putting their admin offices in them.

Welcome. My only experience with the term woke prior to this election cycle was exactly what you are saying. My black friends would use woke in that manner and it was always in jest.

I get how funny this is, but I was reading an article many months ago about how they think extremely dense buildings like this will one day be the best way to save resources, especially in places NOT AT ALL like Saudi Arabia, but in cool climates. Basically, the comments were that it would keep cooler in the hot months and save a ton in the cold months by being self-regulating in temp. I'm not scientist, but if that's true it would be extremely interesting. They were mentioning things like centralized trash disposal and decreasing vehicles because your building would have everything you needed in it like schools, grocery stores, shops, hospitals, doctors, fire, police, USPS, restaurants, movies, etc. It would cater to people working from home, have offices in it, or it could be located near work towers where thousands of people could walk to using connected mass transit, walking tunnels, street-level sidewalks, and elevated bridges. Not to mention all the people required to work in the building itself to keep it running. They were saying (a very quick Googling seems to confirm) that many apartment buildings in NYC only have several hundred apartments and a few have 1,000 apartments or so. These mega-building might have upwards of 15,000 apartments or more. Some could have 20,000 apartments and maybe even 50,000 residents with more staying in hotel rooms. They mentioned that building in Whittier, AK where 99% of the town is in one building, but doing this is in a populated location and doing it in a much nicer fashion. NYC, Toronto, larger cities across the Midwest, etc.

This one might qualify too:

I hope UCF does well, but the ECU Pirates loss was sad. Although, I have a cousin that works for ECU and they enjoyed it. Tennessee's day of reckoning comes this weekend with the Dawgs. If they can beat both of their 2 biggest competitors they deserve the top spot for sure. No argument would seem to make sense. THE OSU has a relatively boring schedule this year. The opening ND game was huge, until it happened. The Penn State game was closer than it should've been, but it wasn't bad. Their day of reckoning comes Thanksgiving weekend against Michigan. That game is at The Shoe and Michigan has had an even easier schedule than THE OSU in my opinion. I'm calling a win for THE OSU. Bama playing LSU this weekend should clarify things on their end. I'm guessing it will be a win for Bama, but how close it is will show if they have it. I'd like them to lose and just be out of the picture for the CFP.

I'm really excited about those tests.

In the interim between my post and seeing yours I spoke to a co-worker who lives in Kissimmee. He also happens to be of Puerto Rican descent. He said the same thing. He said he doesn't go there because it was like the same 5 food trucks repeated 10x each.

I did a quick search of the forums and didn't see anything on the Kissimmee World Food Trucks. Maybe it's tucked somewhere where I wouldn't think to find it? https://www.worldfoodtrucks.com/ First, has anyone been? It's across from Old Town in what used to be a super tacky t-shirt and mega-souvenir shop. It appears that they have actually made it 100x more tacky, but added food trucks and a machine gun shooting range. If I'm being honest, I don't really like heading to the tourist district. I'm interested, though, in the food offerings. Second, I recently read that they are going from about 60 permanent food trucks to around 110-120 food trucks. Having over a 100 food choices is just insane, but in the best way.

The real JUST WOW in this thread is that there are now about 15 almost purely political garbage threads now. BOO ON ALL OF YOU! BOO!

My next journey is a double threat. The Tokyo Metro and the Kyoto Metro! (Shinkansen coming next!) The Tokyo metro is the cleanest system I've ever been on in the entire world. Let's start there. It's amazingly clean and amazingly efficient. I love using it. They use custom rolling stock made by several different companies, but they are all virtually identical inside. They are (as expected) very functional and efficient. The main system will take you almost anywhere in the entire metro area. I've been to Tokyo three times and this was absolutely the best way to get around town. The slightly confusing thing is that there are actually two competing subway companies in Tokyo. If you ever visit and just buy a ticket, this will be an issue. If you (like me) tend to buy a rail pass when visiting cities with these systems, you won't have any issues. I hopped back and forth with no trouble, although most of my travels were on the Tokyo Metro (the other is the Toei Metro). My least favorite part about the metro was that it doesn't connect to Narita Airport. If you are coming to/from the airport you have to take a completely separate express train, hire a cab, or take a bus. I've actually determined that if you are staying near the center of downtown the absolute fastest option is the bus. That may vary depending upon where you stay, but I love the heart of town and intentionally stay near the main Tokyo Station in Chiyoda. That's the easiest place in town to get anywhere from. EVERYTHING is in both English and Japanese. It is absolutely easy to around and the trains run like clockwork. There are 9 TM lines and 4 Toei lines. The main station connects to all of their national roadways, including the Shinkasen. The Kyoto Metro was a little less nice and they only have 2 lines. Everything else about I said about the Tokyo lines is still true. It's clean and efficient. The stations and the trains themselves were a bit more dated, but still wonderful. There were a few places where English was harder to find, but still everywhere had some English for everything. Instead of being on every sign, English might only be one every other sign. You just have to look a little more. The main station in Kyoto is awesome, though. It's beautiful and home to some amazing restaurants. Kyoto is an amazing city and well worth it. I went to Osaka, Kobe, and Nara, but didn't use any public transportation there. I don't know what sort of systems they have. I can tell you that Mt. Fuji doesn't have good public transportation and was a large disappointment in that regard. It was an expensive and annoying day trip that (except for the beauty of the mountain) wasn't worth it at all.

It's a lot like those car dealerships that have ridiculous advertising. We guarantee we'll beat their price or we'll give you the car for free! Let's do the math. Are they going to lose $20? $500? $1000? $2500? or even $5000 on a car deal or are they going to take a full $35,000 loss on an entire vehicle? Even if the competing dealership has them over a barrel on this particular deal with some wacky price and this dealership is going to lose money no matter what, they are going to lose the smallest amount possible. Anything less than the full cost of the vehicle is better than the full cost of the vehicle. So there is a 0% chance of you getting a free car. That doesn't even include all the fine print about how it has to be the exact same model, equipped exactly the same way, and they basically have to be twin cars for them to even consider honoring it.

I'm assuming with a stake like that, they'll do whatever the regulators want. I'm sure that's just divesting X amount of stores in areas where they would have an unfair advantage. I'm against these giant mergers myself, but they never ask me. I know they happen.

I do love tacos.

Much like the airline issues, they did agree to purchase Albertsons. This included how for how much they are paying and what would happen to each company in the merger. That part is done. Whether the sale is completed and the merger is legally allowed to take place is another deal altogether.

Kroger just purchased Albertsons, but since they left Florida a decade ago that means nothing to us. I agree that shopping at Publix is no longer a pleasure. My reasons aren't political in nature. Publix just is offering an inferior product now that they are only competing with big box stores and have no true oranges-to-oranges type of competitor in the region. RIP Albertsons, Goodings, Winn-Dixie (mostly), Kash N' Karry, Lucky's, etc. Quotation marks really only have three uses. A direct quote (e.g. Sir Mix-a-lot said, "I like big butts and I cannot lie!") A minor work from a major work such as a poem, song, or book chapter (e.g. I am a fan of the song "Sir Duke" from the album Songs in the Key of Life.) A completely sarcastic, contrary, or caustic atypical meaning known as scare quotes or written air quotes (e.g. I look at the Kardashians and I am floored by their "mental aptitude" and "superior intelligence" every time they speak.) A classic read: https://www.amazon.com/Book-Unnecessary-Quotation-Marks-Celebration/dp/0811876454 We have bold, italics, and underline for denoting emphasis.

Misused quotation marks confuse me.

Many years ago I used to live over here and would've been more up on that. Thanks!

Did they walk to Hertz up on 436?

According to the news, it has now crested and is going back down.

Heathrow and Gatwick are awful, too.

Akron is always good for a homecoming opponent!

Lake Davis was still almost out to Mills on Sunday. A little piece of personal trivia. I've considered buying the house across from Mills Market (Gore & Mills) twice in the past. Both times I've backed off. Around 2004/5 it was because the price went crazy in the mortgage bubble. In the early 2010s because it was still way more than the house was worth in the condition it was in. Especially since the 2nd time I pondered doing massive amounts of renovations to it. I'm glad I didn't in the end. On normal days the market is too busy for my taste and in events like this, I'd be sad it was flooded.