When I was a teenager, there was a flood along the river where we lived. A large number of mobile homes that were located on the shores of the river were taken out, and destroyed. And six people were missing.

One day after the grand storm, I was walking alongside the tracks beside the river. I was in a remote section of the track. Perhaps two miles away from the town, and in the woods.

Eventually I came across a section that smelled really, REALLY bad. It was so foul that I got off the tracks and went to the edge of the river, where the smell was so damn intense.

I couldn’t see anything, and left. But that afternoon, I later discovered that a body was found at the exact location where I was standing looking for the body.

This is my story for today.

Boring? But, you know… true life experience.

Today…

What did you find while snooping that you wish you had never found?

When I was around 11 I was snooping around in my parents room and saw their bank passbook sitting on their dresser. I opened it up expecting to see a healthy sum of money. Instead there was less than $30 in it. I saw the weekly deposits from my dad’s work and regular withdrawals for cash.

even at that young age I realized that we were poor and what little we had got spent on us kids. I felt terrible when I thought of all the times I’d pushed my folks to spend what they had on treats for me and my sister and brother.

I stopped asking for expensive things after that.

What are the reasons more and more Chinese students abroad decide to return to China?

A year ago, filled with a longing for Western freedom and democracy, I applied to the University of Auckland, thinking that it would be great if I could stay and work or live in New Zealand after graduation.

Now, I am firmly convinced that I should return to China after my graduation because:

1.The salary here is not as high as what I can earn in China,

2.The best city here is only equivalent to a third-tier city in China. Shopping and daily life are not as convenient as in China, and the cost of living is four times higher.

3.The knowledge taught in universities here, I can learn for free on Chinese websites, and it’s richer and more advanced.

4. I participated in two research projects at the University of Auckland and found that the level of research and development here is behind that of equivalent universities in China. I realized that by studying here, I probably won’t be able to bring back advanced knowledge. Therefore, I am considering returning to a Chinese university to further my education.

5. Moreover, I can feel that the majority of people in Western countries still believe they are more developed than China. This is the general perception, and I don’t need to explain it. I’ll just return to China and quietly contribute my strength there.

6. Western culture, there seems to be a preference for those who are boastful and talkative rather than those who are low-key and pragmatic. Coincidentally, as a Chinese person, I am not good at boasting, and I prefer to fulfill my responsibilities and then rest. The Chinese workplace is more accommodating to someone with my traits.

In fact, I spent hundreds of thousands of RMB to come to New Zealand, to see the real Western world, improve my English, and then met a group of Chinese students and a few friendly foreign students, and ate food that I wasn’t quite used to for a year.

What, as a parent, could you not believe you had to explain to another parent?

I’m not a parent, but as a teacher I had to explain to a mother about bedtimes and sleep for a seven year old.

Her son was always tired and had difficulty staying awake during class. He was not working to his potential.

His mom came to discuss his poor grades. Come to find out, she was under the impression that he slept too much. So, she kept him up to midnight and had him get up at 6:00 a.m. No wonder the poor lad was always tired. I would be, too.

So, I explained to her that growing children needed at least 10 hours of sleep nightly as their bodies were growing and sleeping gave their bodies time to rest, heal, and grow.

She started having him go to bed at 8:00, especially on school nights. Within a week, he was brighter, more chipper, and the quality of his work improved immensely.

The interesting part? About a month later, he gave me a big hug and thanked me for telling his mom he needed to go to bed earlier.

What was the craziest thing a mechanic said about your car?

I took my nice little VW Beetle Diesel to a mechanic for an oil change. After they got the car on the rack, the service advisor came out “Your car has a really bad oil leak.”

Before you go farther, bear in mind: This was a diesel. This comes in important later.

I go back to the bay and take a look at the purported oil leak. The bottom half of the back of the engine was covered in fresh, amber colored oil. “Oh, you’ve got a huge oil leak. You need to pay us $200 to diagnose the problem.” I called for the shop manager.

“Your employee claims that this car has an oil leak.”

He looks under there. “Yup. Sure does.”

“You know this is a diesel.”

“Why does that matter?”

“Have you ever seen the oil drained from a diesel?”

“Yeah.”

“Then you know that if I put fresh oil in this engine and drive the car three blocks, that oil will be as black as the Ace of Spades. This supposed oil leak, which is in a place oil can’t leak out of, is fresh oil.”

“Umm…”

“Listen. Clean all the oil he sprayed on my engine off it right now so I can go somewhere honest.”

The unbreakable rule

What is something you absolutely despise about your country?

Finn here.

The climate. Finland is located between 60th and 70th North, which makes the climate absolutely miserable.

The location means the winters are long, dark and miserable – sun rising at Christmas only at 09:00 in Helsinki and setting at 15:00. The situation isn’t exactly improved by the fact that Finland is located at the occlusion zone of Ferrel cell, which means the whole Atlantic comes down from the sky each Spring and Autumn. (Oh, Autumn is really Fall – I mean, rainfall. Finnish rain is not the warm shower as the Mediterranean rains, it is hard, cold and scourging.)

Finland has the worst of both littoral and continental climate: cool summers and freezing winters. Oh, and did I mention rasputitsa? Yup, we have it too.

The cold and miserable weather and the long and dark winter has left its permanent mark on our national soul. Finns tend to be emotionally cold, dour and close-minded. Not rude nor impolite, but cold. Sorry, no jolly reggae tunes here. Hero metal, power metal, black metal and prog metal. If your playing sucks, turn on more overdrive.

Which leads to another problem. Alcohol use is commonplace. Simply to carry over the worst. Getting hammered is a method to cope with the cold, dark and miserable winter.

Which leads to another problem. Suicides tend to be common, but not as common as they used to be. Many people simply cannot stand it all and quit their living.

Atheism is in Scandinavia a far older phenomenon than science. When the soil is poor, weather hostile and everything in the climate tries to kill you, you relate to supernatural as enemies and any deities as intolerable cosmic oppressors. The divine is not seen as a provider, but oppressor – as something which attempts to make living even more miserable than it already is. This is one reason why the Scandinavians are so hostile to religion and spirituality they tend to be. Already the Hrafnkell’s saga from 10th century tells of a Viking chieftain who ditches the Viking gods and becomes godhlauss, Atheist.

I wish I had wings so I could fly to Spain for winter like the migratory birds.

I’d choose the sandwich

What is the nicest thing you have done that no one knows about?

A bit of background: My parents recently got divorced and my dad got most of the money, furniture and he got the house. My brother (10) and I (13) only see our mom every second weekend and sometimes my dad just keeps us for the weekend. I always stop by my moms After school everyday to let her dog out and clean up any messes she made (She’s 17 and black lab). I usually wait there for bit until I have to pick up my brother.

Anyways, one day, my math teacher asked me to stay behind for a few minute so to talk about an opportunity to compete in a math contest. It was country wide and was for grade ten and eleven math. I’m grade seven but he said that’s he talked to the people who were running it. They said I could try but might have some trouble with it. I really like math so I said yes.

Fast forward two weeks and I’m sitting in the cafeteria with a bunch of really tall people. They hand out the papers and say go. I finish in about half an hour and turn mine in.

About a month ago i got the results and i placed third in the country. Apparently, there was a prize and i won three hundred dollars.

Now, my mom has been struggling financially although she didn’t tell us, I figured it out. Every time I stop by her house, I put some of the money in her jar and she hasn’t but noticed. I know it’s probably not a lot but I like to think I’m helping a at least a little bit. I can’t legally work yet…

Man, the USA is fucked up.

What is the best lie you have ever told your child?

When my due date was getting very close, I told my 3 and a half year old daughter that her little brother is afraid to come out of my belly. He thinks to himself: Oh, its a big scary world out there. Who knows what is awaiting for me outside. I’m just a little baby boy. I don’t want to go out and live with big grown up people all by myself.. Who will understand me and help me when I’m outside? Oh how I wish there was a little girl out there who would be my sister, so we can grow up together…

She was deeply moved when she heard this. She put her little hand gently on my belly, and whispered to her brother with a voice filled with tenderness. Come out little brother. I am your sister M. and I will always take care of you. You don’t have to be afraid. Few days after this, her brother came, and the love and connection that the two of them have is something I, as an only child, never imagined could exist. The way they cherish one another, help, encourage and comfort along the way is truly amazing.

Are school uniforms the most effective way to eliminate social and economic differences between students?

It’s not going to eliminate the difference at all. However, it could help the less rich kids to maintain their dignity.

This is the most common school uniform in China. It’s ugly, oversized, and appeard since my school ages, but totally affordable. It wouldn’t change the fact that some kids have a poor family background, but it could reduce the possibility of students getting isolated in schools for either being too poor or rich. Trust me that kids do that all the time, and it could be quite hurtful sometimes.

Besides, with an ugly uniform, how one looks like purely relys on face. Dad’s mercedes or even GTR wouldn’t save it.

This is very serious what is going on

Not really Communism, though…

Can you describe a time that your company only discovered that you were irreplaceable after they fired you? How did you feel? What did they do?

I am a welder and applied to a job through a temp agency. Their ad said hiring welders from $23 to $26 an hour depending on experience. They gave me a weld test and decided to hire me at $23. I told them I want $26 because that’s what their add said. I was told that was dependent on experience. Well I have 24 years of experience and I want 26. In the end I agreed to work for 25.

On my first night it was time to clock out so I went to the time clock and clocked out. I noticed all the other welders were still there cleaning up their work areas. I shouted at them so they could hear me, “hey it’s time to go. What are you all still doing here?”

I didn’t get an answer and left. Coming in the next day I asked them about this and they said they cleaned up the shop after hours on their time. With all the workers around and the boss I told everyone, “I don’t work for free. This mess wouldn’t be here if I hadn’t been here working. I won’t be cleaning the shop for free. I am loud quitting boss” as I made eye contact with the foreman, “when my shift is over I am clocking out and going home. I will have my area cleaned up before then.”

That night was the first night they did weld testing because new clients demanded all their welders were certified welders.

The next morning the temp agency called me and asked me not to go back to the job because I had been terminated for not listening.

The morning after I was called back again. I was the only person on 2nd shift who passed the weld test and many on first shift also failed.

Company representative: “Would you come back to work for us, please?”

Me: “OK but I want $28 an hour and switched to 1st shift.”

Company representative: “we can’t do that”

Me: “Good bye”

50 Bucks and a pack of cigarettes

What was the most obvious hint that someone hitting on you ever gave but you totally missed it?

In Vietnam, when we meet someone for the first time in the new (lunar) year, we usually give each other a red envelope with some lucky money – as a good wish for a bright and happy new year.

I was in 11th grade in high school. We were just back from the Lunar New Year holiday (”Tết” holiday in Vietnamese), happily exchanging red envelopes and good wishes. Coincidentally, it was also Valentine’s Day that year. But, 20 years ago, I had no idea about that, so when this boy handed me the red envelope with a chocolate bar, “Happy Valentine!”, I happily took it, “Thank you! You’re so sweet!”, and I gave him a big hug.

Before he could say anything else, I opened the chocolate bar, broke it into pieces, and… shared it with the whole class, everyone got a piece. I couldn’t explain the emotion in his eyes when he watched that happened.

Years later, every time we meet up for our class reunion, he always brings this story up and we laugh. Still can’t believe I missed that hint.

CIA

Back in the late 70’s I found myself between jobs. I had 10 years as the GM of aof a chain of convenience stores which had been sold and that ended my job! My parents lived in the Washington DC area and one of their neighbors, who I had known for many years, worked for the CIA. At a neighborhood gathering while I was visiting I mentioned to him that I was job hunting and asked if he had any connections in the CIA. After we had returned home I got a call asking if I would like to interview so I flew back up and stayed with my parents for a week.

I was instructed to report to a building in Rosslyn VA which is across the Potomac River from DC. I remember having a hard time finding the address I was given because there was no name or numbers on the building. Maybe that was my first test! In any case, the interview lasted all week. One thing that I remember was is how low key the whole process was. Mostly a series of different people asking me a lot of questions about myself. What my hobbies were, favorite foods. etc. It reminded me of shooting the breeze with a bunch of strangers at a college mixer. Not much in writing, no physicals, drug tests, etc. Not many probing questions, very relaxed. Definitely the strangest interview I’ve ever had, and this went on for 5 days.

There was one woman who was my primary contact. From the beginning to the end, she was the one who was always there at the end of an interview and introduced me to the next person. Never their last name or title, just a first name, always in the same room, never in their office. On the 5th and final day, she brought me into her office and said that they would like me to work for them as an operative. I had never heard that term before, but knew that it meant that the CIA wanted me to be a spy. Immediate visions of James Bond came to mind. Fast cars, nice clothes, A GUN…all the things that we associate with being a spy. Obviously I was very interested.

I had a bunch of questions but the two that I remember were: 1. Where would I be stationed? and 2. What did they want me to do? I was married with two young children, and I was thinking maybe they wanted me in Europe where I had spent many years as a boy. WRONG! They wanted me to operate a small grocery store in PAGO PAGO! I had never even heard of Pago Pago, let alone knew that there was a large US Navy Base there. Out in the middle of the Pacific Ocean, thousands of miles from everything and everyone we know, it was out of the question.

That was the end of my spy recruitment.

LOL. All, I do mean ALL of the stores in Pago Pago are owned by Chinese nationals. No fucking shit. -MM

Chinese Rufus

Has an unknown stranger ever paid a massive bill for you? What happened?

I was a semi-freshly divorced single mom working in a chain of gas stations. It was my job to cover if someone called off and to run the money every day.

I had a reliable car only because my parents both took the time to teach me about cars including how to find a good used one and repair it when it broke.

I was enrolled in college. One class at a time is all I could squeeze in my schedule and budget.

My child was suffering under a rural southern school district. She is gifted and they had refused to set an IEP, refused to challenge her, and in fact persecuted her and myself due to our religion. We were told more than once we were going to Hell by school officials.

It was an uphill battle with them that required an attorney who volunteered his services. I couldn’t have afforded him otherwise.

Despite these difficulties, life was OK. We were surviving. We had food, shelter, and running water. My child never went to bed hungry or cold.

Then I started getting tired. Abnormally tired. I didn’t have the energy to function. My mother forced me to go to her doctor. She paid for the visit because I didn’t have insurance.

The doctor called me at work two days later and asked me to come in. I made arrangements for my child after school and I went.

He told me I was sick. Very sick. The tiredness was a symptom of this. It wasn’t just lack of proper nutrition or being over worked. This wasn’t something that could be fixed with a pill.

I started treatment the next week. I still went to work. I still took care of my child. I had to drop my class and adjust my schedule. I had to fight — and fight I did.

Then the medical bills started coming in. Uninsured and dead broke, I almost gave up. The state said I did not qualify for assistance of any kind because I made too much money.

If I had another child, I’d be at the income threshold. If I had another child, I could collect benefits like food stamps, Medicaid, and housing assistance.

If the state would have straightened out the child support instead of counting it against my income, I might have been able to pay a little bit of the medical bills.

I made arrangements for my child’s care after I passed. I had a small life insurance policy that would cover my final expenses. I managed to keep fighting.

The medical bills kept coming as did the phone calls from debt collectors. The threatening letters. The calls to my work. To say it was stressful is an understatement.

Until one day they stopped. The medical bills still came but showed a zero balance. The bills that had gone into collections were paid in full.

My rabbi approached me one night after services. He told me that a member of our shul had paid everything on the caveats I finish school and don’t stop.

I begged him to tell me who but he would NOT budge. He just said, “Finish your education and don’t stop.”

Finish school and don’t stop.

I still do not know who. I’ve had my suspicions, but I keep them to myself.

I have graduated but haven’t finished my education. (That is something that is never going to be finished.)

I haven’t stopped.

Smart Cat

Downtown Grill Catfish LaFitte

This is one of my favorite ways to prepare catfish. Even those who dislike catfish love it fixed this way.

Yield: 4 servings

Ingredients

• 2 large eggs, beaten
• 1 cup milk
• 2 cups all-purpose flour
• 1 1/4 teaspoons salt, divided
• 1 1/2 teaspoons ground red pepper, divided (may need 2 1/2 teaspoons)
• 4 farm-raised catfish fillets, about 1 1/2 pounds
• Vegetable oil
• 12 large fresh shrimp, unpeeled
• 1 tablespoon butter or margarine
• 2 teaspoons minced garlic
• 1/4 cup sweet vermouth
• 2 cups whipping cream
• 1/4 cup chopped green onions, divided
• 2 teaspoons lemon juice
• 3 very thin cooked ham slices, cut into strips
• Garnish: lemon wedges

Instructions

1. Combine eggs and milk, stirring until well blended.
2. Combine flour, 1 teaspoon salt, and 1/2 teaspoon red pepper in a shallow dish. Dredge fish in flour mixture; dip in milk mixture. Dredge again in flour mixture.
3. Pour oil to a depth of 3 inches into a Dutch oven; heat to 360 degrees F. Fry fish for 5 to 6 minutes or until golden; drain on paper towels. Keep warm.
4. Peel shrimp; devein, if desired. Melt butter in a large skillet over medium heat; add shrimp and garlic, and cook until shrimp turn pink, stirring often. Remove shrimp, reserving drippings.
5. Stir vermouth into reserved drippings; bring to a boil, and cook 1 minute. Add whipping cream, 2 tablespoons green onions, lemon juice, remaining 1/4 teaspoon salt, and remaining 1 to 2 teaspoons red pepper; cook 12 to 15 minutes or until sauce is thickened, stirring often.
6. Place catfish on a serving plate, and drizzle with sauce. Top with shrimp and ham; sprinkle with remaining 2 tablespoons green onions. Garnish, if desired.

Notes

I make the sauce first and keep it warm. I then fry the fish and finish the dish.

The Big Lie that Women Keep Believing in Modern Dating

Don’t people in China wish to live in a democratic country?

As a 31-year-old Chinese person who lived in China for 30 years and has been living in New Zealand for a year, I find that this question seems to be of particular concern to people in the Western world, while we ourselves are not so concerned about it. I have also thought about this for a long time, and I would like to give a rather serious answer.

When I was living in China, politics really didn’t have much to do with our lives. In the daily routine of a normal person, we were essentially free and democratic. Moreover, from childhood, we learned about both Chinese culture and Western culture. We were quite familiar with the Western world from our media, and we knew roughly what the world was like. After going abroad, it was also easy for us to embrace Western culture.

However, after coming to New Zealand, I found that the Western media is full of prejudice against China and North Korea, while reporting differently on East Asian countries like Japan and South Korea. In fact, I particularly want to tell many Western friends who have never been to China that it is easy for us to accept Western civilization, but your points of concern about China seem to differ from what we care about ourselves.

Historically, China has never actively pursued religion, so how could it be actively enamored with politics? As long as the party does not disturb the people, we won’t pay too much attention to it, and a political party is the least intrusive solution. China is a country that has been agriculturally based for thousands of years. Our ancestors loved the land that could grow crops, and this love has flowed into our blood. The charming land that produces enchanting crops makes us ordinary people happy. China is large enough that whether at the top or among ordinary people, everyone can find their own focus in life, everyone takes responsibility for their own duties, rather than thinking about taking advantage of others or stealing from others. This is more efficient and safe.

If the leadership does not perform well, the people will resist together, and our history has always been this way. An ordinary person can grow to be a top figure in the country, or a top figure over a piece of land. With 5,000 years of detailed recorded history, many historically high-ranking people came from common families. So, when you ask if Chinese people want to live in a democratic country, I want to say that we have always been democratic. Every Chinese person knows: “The noble and the humble have no determined lineage,” but as a culturally united nation, if we are in a high position and do not make the contributions we should, we will be shamefully recorded in history, which is as important as life itself to every Chinese person. Thus, even though we have equal opportunities to become influential figures, not everyone wants to be the most powerful because that also means taking on more responsibilities, which can be more tiring (the positions of emperor, prime minister, and general in Chinese history were high-stress jobs). So usually for us, enjoying the life of an ordinary person also seems more relaxing.

However, it seems that Western politicians do not have the same immense pressures as Chinese leaders, nor do they have the same sense of responsibility. Your leaders seem very relaxed, speaking eloquently with expressive gestures, whereas our leaders are sparing with words, and mostly very serious. How should I put it? They are also under great work pressure, as they are not only supervised by hundreds of millions of common people but also by their competitors. But from my heart, I like this Chinese style where everyone has their role and does not interfere with others.

Compared to many Western countries, China is very open. I grew up in a very ordinary family in China, reading masterpieces from all over the world from a young age, experiencing different cultures, which is why I chose to go abroad after getting married and having children. I have also read modern and ancient Chinese books, which enables me to answer this question today.

For foreign friends curious about China, if you want to understand China, you are sincerely welcome to visit, especially if your daily exposure is only to English media. Because they seem to be the most heavily brainwashed region at the moment.

How true is the statement that if China adopt electoral democracy, their politicians will be corrupt?

There is already corruption in China. I mean not USA style corruption. The USA is almost as corrupt as Ukraine.

But here’s the thing.

Corruption is actually punished in China. With the PENALTY of DEATH.

This man here? He was in the TOP ten most powerful men in China.

He took bribes. He is rotting in prison now, he was sentenced to DEATH in 2020 😀

Most westerners now are hahaha death is a soft punishment! They think that resignation is the ULTIMATE PUNISHMENT.

You remember when Jon Corzine walked off with 2 billion dollars? He went on television and said it simply evaporated.

At the same time this man

Citizens found he had better stuff than his pay grade. They reported it. He lost EVERYTHING.

BUT BUT westerners cry! We can vote them out and make them suffer.

How can you tell someone is faking intelligence?

Somewhere in my graduate school years I noticed a trend.

An undergraduate philosophy major will sound absolutely brilliant. They often speak in a jargon-dense diction, delivered at high velocity, one idea bouncing off another to produce a spiderweb of spiraling associations. The effect, rhetorically and aesthetically, is often overwhelming. Logic doesn’t really play a role because one hardly knows what they are saying. The unwitting listener feels himself outmatched, drowned and blinded by the naked light of unbridled genius.

The graduate student is a much dimmer light. He is still full of abstract phrases and obscure references, but he is someone who is starting to sound, again, like a human being — explaining things, pausing, asking questions to insure the listener is following. This is not nearly as impressive as the undergraduate, but it does have the virtue of allowing the ordinary among us to understand what is being said.

The professor sounds like your basic “dad,” albeit one with a lot to say. He can at times seem unsure of himself. He pauses to define his terms and to add qualifications to his statements. He speaks carefully. He might even speak slowly. He explains as he goes, almost apologizing for whatever obscurities he falls into. His manner of speech is, well… designed to communicate! A quite boring and not evidently bright fellow, you almost feel embarrassed for him.

In light of these observations, I was forced to conclude that there is either something terribly wrong with our educational system — since the higher people go the dumber they get — or intelligence is not quite what we sometimes think it is.

Show me your boobies

If a nuclear bomb is about to explode 2 miles away from you in 30 minutes, what is the first place you would go to?

In my van. We would drive away with the pedal to the metal. In 30 minutes, I could expect to get at least 50 kilometres away, and that ought to be far enough to be safe. Moreover, the van has a Diesel engine, so it does not need electricity to function – it will run as long as there is fuel and air.

---

If it was summer, I would drive to our yacht, put SCUBA gear on, and dive in the sea in the marina. There is enough oxygen to survive the blast underwater. Most radiation is absorbed in the sea, and the shock wave would not get to the water.

What was your “Aha!” moment during a toxic relationship that made you realize people never change?

I dated a girl for a few years and we lived together for the last half of the relationship. Things hadn’t been great for several months before I decided to break it off, but it was a single statement she made that convinced me it was time.

The yard was in serious need of some attention. The grass was a bit high and we hadn’t done weeding in a few weeks. So I decided to spend my day off working in the yard.

I mowed the grass and edged the walks, I weeded all the flower beds, watered and fertilized our plants, got some new plants to fill in the beds. After I was done with all that, I decided to do some cleaning. I power washed the driveway and the house. The concrete looked brand new.

I finished shortly before she got home from work. When she got in, I was in the backyard admiring my handiwork. I was proud of how the yard looked. It hadn’t looked that nice in quite a while.

When she came into the backyard, I motioned towards all my hard work with my hands as if to says “look what I did!”.

The only thing she had to say about it was “You forgot to sweep behind the chiminea.” and pointed to a small pile of leaves off in the corner of our yard. Then went inside to take a shower.

Something snapped in my brain. All the times she had criticized stupid things just to have something to criticize came flooding back. I suddenly realized the obvious pattern that had been there all along. She didn’t just do it to me either. It was just who she was to everyone. She just enjoyed criticizing people.

I knew I couldn’t live life like that. I knew that if I stuck around, she would keep doing that for the rest of our lives and it would make me miserable.

I had just spent my entire day doing yard work in the middle of June and she couldn’t find one positive thing to say about it. I left that evening and stayed with a friend. The next day, I came home and broke it off with her.

Every man on Earth

What was the most unexpected knock you got on your door?

I was about 10 years old, and in bed – about 11pm. I was supposed to be asleep, but as usual, I was reading by the light of my nightlight. I heard my dad slam the front door, and my mom yell. This wasn’t normal behavior, so I went into the living room.

The police were called, and my dad told me the story. Mom and Dad were in the living room, and heard a knock at the front door. We lived out in the country, and the neighbors all knew Dad was a doctor, so Dad thought it might be a neighbor needing help. When Dad opened the door, he saw a man with a mask standing there with one hand behind his back. Our super friendly, loved everybody German Shorthair, Ringo, followed Dad to the door. As soon as she saw the man, she gave a huge bark, and lunged for the guy. Dad said that 3 things happened nearly simultaneously – 1) he grabbed Ringo’s collar, 2) the guy pointed a gun at Dad (it was in the hand behind his back), 3) the man shot the gun. Dad slammed and locked the door. Dad was unhurt.

When the police arrived, they spent a long time looking opposite the door to try to find a bullet hole. At one point, one of the officers said that maybe it was a blank. But eventually, one of the policemen noticed that the row of art books we had on the bookshelf facing the door wasn’t completely even; one of them was pushed back about an inch. He peered closely at it, and noticed something odd about the O (it might have been Michelangelo) in the title – it had a hole in the middle of the O. He opened up the book, and sure enough, the bullet was nestled in the pages.

Needless to say, there was a rule in our house after that – don’t open the door at night without asking “Who’s there” first!

Have you ever met a dangerous person and not known it at the time?

I used to own a small tavern. We had a guy who started hanging out there quite regularly. Nice guy, played darts with the other regulars, bought rounds in order , but didn’t talk much about himself or his past. But it’s a bar, so no one cares. We’ll call him John.

He was in early one night around 7pm. My staff is all away on lunch, partner wouldn’t be back til 10pm. I’m all alone. Usually not a big deal. This night, a couple of college jocks got way out of hand and started tearing the place up – breaking cue sticks and tossing around empty kegs. It’s just John, me and the college boys. I’m trying to de-escalate and get them to leave. Then, one of the big guys starts pushing me and throwing punches. I’m screwed. That is, until John steps in and beats the shit out of two guys much bigger than himself. I was completely shocked! We toss the guys out and he tells me not to call the police. He leaves shortly afterwards.

Next time I see John, I want to pick up his tab and chat. He asks me not to tell anyone or talk about it. I figure he’s ex-military and a private guy. He becomes pretty scarce. We’re looking for him, but he doesn’t come around anymore.

About a year later, we see his pic in the paper. He’s on trial for a pair of mob related murders. Turns out he might be responsible for more than a couple of these. I’m very glad he liked me.

US Ambassador threaten to shut Ghana’s economy down if Anti-Gay bill pass

Yup. The United States foreign policy at work.

What’s the fastest you’ve wiped a smirk off of someone’s face?

I lived in northern Manitoba and southern Ontario, both in Canada, for about 25 years before I moved to southern Maryland. Snowmageddon struck in January-February of 2010. Everything was shut down for 10 days or so. Finally, I ventured out onto the roads.

My apartment complex fronted a 4 lane divided roadway, which was a designated Snow Emergency Route. The left lane was bare, the right lane was still covered with ice and slush. Both lanes were blocked where an SUV had gotten stuck then started to slide into the ditch to the right of the road. Pickup trucks, cars, other SUVs, vans, all were parked higgly jiggly and tall, brawny men were attempting to get the vehicle out.

I parked well back, walked to the crowd in my Canadian snow boots, and offered to help. They all had a good laugh, then turned away. I tapped on a man’s arm, “I grew up in Wisconsin and lived in Canada for 25 years. I know snow.”

“Hey, let the little lady here give it a try!”

I cleared them away from the car, crunched around it, repositioned the men, instructed the driver to straighten her wheels and put it into LOW gear, no gas! Told the men to push again, rocking, and told the driver to release the brakes.

The SUV popped right out of the icy ruts and kept going. Silently, the men returned to their cars and left. Too cold for crickets, I guess…

What did you notice during an interview that made you not want the job?

I was interviewing for a Canadian regional sales manager’s job for a company that sold patent medicines, made in Saudi Arabia. (Yes, I wrote the correct country name.)

After having introduced ourselves the interviewer handed me a package of papers, about ten pages thick.

“I’ll be quiet for a few minutes until you have read and signed this.”

It was the most horrible secrecy agreement you could imagine. If I break this, my grandson’s firstborn would be burned on the stake, or something along those lines.

I put it down, and politely bade my adieus.

The interviewer followed me all the way to the elevator door, trying to explain that not all was cast in stone. Some details could be negotiated.

I entered the elevator and left.

My next job was selling industrial valves, no secrecy agreement required. (I stayed there 9.5 years.)

Dead Bedrooms

https://www.youtube.com/shorts/cuWLECYMWxo?feature=share

What did you see going on in the back of the school bus that shocked you?

The school arranged for a bus load of junior high students to go to a live play in the city.

This was the second bus trip in a month. The first one had gotten a little steamy on the ride back to the school in the dark. But not so bad it stopped the second one from happening.

The second trip, stopped all future bus trips, and caused a general assembly to be called. The principal and vice principal were dismissed at the end of the school year.

I didn’t have a girlfriend, and my best friends sister wanted to make out with me, but I knew that would end my friendship with my best friend. She wasn’t attractive enough to risk that.

In the back row, you could only see two guys sitting up, one in each seat. There had been girls sitting beside them when we left for the school.

What brought it to a head, was that the majority of students had hickies that were visible to their parents when they got home from the school trip.

There were a lot of phone calls leading up to the general assembly. It was amazing how many students had purple splotches, vainly trying to be covered with turtle necks, and long sleeves, and they had to sit in the front row of the general assembly, as we were told the consequences of our actions.

Do you continue to greet neighbors who never say hello first?

My mother was a nurse.

One day, she came home with a bruise on her cheek – just a small one, but it was a bruise. I asked what happened to her? She told me that a patient’s son hit her in the face because he thought she was ignoring his father – who was in pain while actually she was busy with another patient who was more critical. I asked her what happened next? She told me: “Oh, I came to that patient as soon as I finished with the one I was working on. Talked to him, comforted him and gave him some meds. Then I explained the situation to the son, and he apologized”. 7 year old me that day got angry and asked: “Why? You’re the best nurse, why didn’t you let someone else deal with that patient? His son hit you. He didn’t deserve your care!”

And my mom’s answer that day became one of the most important lessons I carry with myself through life: “Sweetie, you should never let someone’s bad action to be the reason for your own. Fixing something wrong by doing something wrong will never work. That man hit me may have been wrong, but if I hadn’t taken care of his father, I wouldn’t have been right. Moreover, it was the son who made the mistake, why should the father has to face the consequences? Your mom is the best nurse, so I do the best, right?”

So, if my neighbor never says hello to me first? That doesn’t stop me from saying hello and wishing them a good day.

I still believe that in this world full of sad/angry people, it’s much better if we’re sweet to each other, even just a littleeeeeee bit.

They know her language

Do you think the recent incident where a Chinese navy destroyer used active sonar to harass a disabled Australian frigate will threaten the pro-China government in Australia?

I strongly condemn Chinese military using sonar of mass destruction near Chinese coast which caused damage to Australian soldiers close Australian coast.

Wait… the Australians were near Chinese coast.

Oh… so you were their collecting seabed information, right?

In case of WWIII, it would be useful to intercept Chinese submarines.

International water or not, it’s definitely a hostile activity against China.

I can already make the draft about the same thing but reversed, i.e. PLAN soldiers got hurt by Australian sonar near Australian coast.

---

There is no “pro-China government in Australia”.

We know that already.

Stop lying.

Miao Ethnic Group

This is one of the 65 recognized ethnic groups in China.

What is the most absurd thing you’ve been charged for on a bill?

The flags for the cars at my mother-in-laws funeral.

Well, they tried.

When they were doing their consult, they went over about a million things with my wife, and her brother. Both of whom were pretty deep in grief as they had just lost their mother. This woman was more of a mother to me than my own, so I wasn’t exactly NOT grieving.

Before my wife signed on the dotted line, she asked me to look the paperwork over. I saw a HUGE line item, it was around $2000, and just listed as “flags”. I asked the wife about it, and I asked the brother-in-law. Both had no idea what it was. I asked the representative from the funeral home, and they said it was for the funeral flags for the cars. The little magnetic “flags” that say “FUNERAL” on them. They are plastic, and have a magnetic base on them and you put them on your front fenders. If you have seen a few funeral processions, I’m sure you have seen them.

So I asked why we were paying $2000 for these.

I was told we had estimated 100 people, and they charge $10 per flag, and 2 per car. so 100x2x$10=$2000.

I asked if these were required, or if they thought that literally every single person was going to be driving their own car, or, the pretty obvious question, would this get re-rated based on how many people ACTUALLY showed up and needed a flag.

I was told that no, they were not ‘required’ but that they were recommended to make it more visible, and that wouldn’t my MIL want that item? They would re-estimate based on how many cars I expected (yeah, they KNEW that the estimate of how many guests was NOT the same as how many cars there would be), but that once the order was put in, it was non-refundable, and that if we didn’t use them all, then that was just how it was. They were basically being paid to make them available.

I went back to the wife and BIL, and explained, they agreed, nope, not necessary. I told them we didn’t need this, and to remove it immediately. They acted like that was some manner of travesty, and basically implied that people would think poorly of us for it. I knew my MIL, and KNEW she would have spit her teeth out if we had wasted $2k on this. There was a lot of shade from the funeral people for this.

Strangely enough, day of, not a single person asked about the flags. We turned out headlights on, and drove in procession with absolutely no problems whatsoever. Ironically, the only vehicle with the flags was the hearse, it had them permanently attached to it. We weren’t charged for that.

The funeral industry literally preys on people at their most vulnerable. They prey on your emotions, and your fears and insecurities. They have no trouble manipulating you into paying more than is necessary, and they will pad that bill out to match any insurance you might have. Do NOT just give them the insurance information, magically, if you have $35000 in insurance, they will eat every penny of it up. We had, $0 and paid every penny out of pocket… They still tried to pad the bill at every turn.

“What is the most absurd thing you’ve been charged for on a bill?”

edit

yes, these ARE reusable, and yes, they are returned after the procession, and yes, that does make it so much worse.

Good men won’t stick around if they are unwanted

Canadian “Mercenary” Killed By Russian Army in Ukraine

World Hal Turner

The Russian Armed Forces announced today:

“Canadian Mercenary, Joshua Mayers from Alberta, Canada has been successfully liquidатеd by the Russian army in the Bakhmut direction.

Joshua abandoned his family to go fight for Ukraine in September 2023, and was liquidатеd on November 10th 2023.

Hope it was worth it all.”

Eight?

Dad finds out his daughters “body count”. His expression…

What is the most unforgettable sentence that someone said to you?

When I decided to move halfway across the Earth, from Vietnam to the U.S. to marry my (then) boyfriend, the only ‘condition’ I made my boyfriend agree to was I wanted him to move closer to his parents. My reason was that I would be in a new country, I wanted to stay close to our family. He agreed.

So, when The Teenager & I moved over, we settled down in a place within one hour drive from our parents.

Then came the first meet-up, we invited a few other family friends over. My mom & I were in the kitchen preparing food when a lady came in. She saw me, smiled, and asked my mom, “So, here is your daughter-in-law hah?” My mom smiled back at her, “No. She is my daughter in love.”

That sentence struck a harmonious chord within me and made my heart sing.

What is the one in a million coincidence you have ever had?

My wife and I were living in our first house in Oklahoma City. One day while we were both at work, the city sewer department tore down all the fences in the rear of the houses on our block to replace the sewer main. When we got home from work we were heartbroken because we had had our young dog in the backyard and now he was nowhere to be found. We searched the area for days and put up notices but to no avail.

We were starting to believe that we would never see our dog again. My wife was so upset she decided to call the city to “give them a piece of her mind” about the lack of notification on the sewer work causing us to lose our dog.

So she gets a person on the phone from the city’s Ombudsman Department. My wife explains the situation and tells the person that we loved that dog and had paid good money for him because he was a registered Irish setter. The person asks where we live and my wife gives our address. The person says “Well that’s amazing. I live about a half mile from you and there’s been an Irish setter hanging around lately.” My wife tells me the address and when I got to the person’s house, there’s our dog.

Oklahoma City is a big metropolitan area. Of all the people in the metro area my wife might have got on the phone, our dog happened to be at that person’s house.

Why can’t fast food establishments give the unsold food to the homeless people at the end of the night?

I managed a cookie shop once. It was in a college town, and was open til 11:30 pm. At the end of the night, a homeless person showed up asking for cookies. I gave him some.

the next night, he brought 3 friends. There were just enough cookies for them. The next night, I was swamped. Literally dozens showed up. I didn’t have enough cookies for all of them. The crowd became enraged. They started yelling at me, then they started throwing things at me.

i told them not to come around again, there would be no more free cookies. I had to take a cab home that night, it was unsafe for me to walk.

The next night, a few of them started following me as I walked home. They were loudly talking about how they were going to rape and kill me. I ducked into an open business and called a cab home again. I was very young, and made just over minimum wage. I couldn’t afford to take a cab every night, but I had to for weeks.

I did make arrangements with a night nurse, who worked at a local hospital. She dropped by at closing every night on her way to work, and picked up the last cookies to take to the break room.

Having had that experience, I would never give food from a restaurant to homeless people again. Many years later, I owned a bakery, but still remembered my lesson.

The UFO Incident That Shocked Ariel School: Telepathic Extraterrestrials (Re-Edit)

“It’s like story time for grown-ups. I really appreciate this channel. Hecklefish is my spirit animal.”

What are you banned from? Why?

I was banned from my local Walmart because I miss scanned an item. I went to self checkout one day because I had 4 items and wanted to teach my sons how to scan items. To make the story easier to understand, I had a tshirt, set of bras, shorts and some socks. While scanning, we had accidently double scanned the bras rather than scan the shorts, honest mistake. We finish up and as we are heading out, loss protection stops me and says “My name is XXX I’m with loss prevention please come with us” I was genuinely confused, my son got scared because of how aggressive they were but we complied. While in the security room they proceeded to rummage thru my bags and asked to search my purse. Again, I complied, but they never explained why I was pulled in. They searched cameras for probabaly 20 minutes. At one point, I hear one of the workers call across the radio “We need security detail for an escort.” I started getting REALLY scared and demanded an answer. Finally, they explain I miss scanned an item, because of this I am being escorted out of the building and will not be allowed back on property, should I step foot on property I will be arrested. I was baffled! They didn’t even give me a chance to fix my honest mistake! Needless to say, again I complied, but I put in a call the corporate after leaving, they reached out to me and lifted the banned immediately, apologized, and fired the entire loss prevention team. It wasn’t the first time they had abused power!

What vulnerabilities does the U.S. face by being dependent on China for Rare Earth Elements?

Every shit that the US does on China, the Chinese can do even more, faster cheaper and more painful to the U.S.

China prefers not to but it is always ready. Chinese people has a saying. If you do it on the 1st Luna calendar. We will reciprocate on the 15th. You mentioned rare earth but this is just one out of a thousand measure. It could checkmate the US. Don’t even think about it. Every hurt on China will be returned by several fold hurt on the U.S.

What is something everyone should consider doing?

My father called me yesterday.

Dad: Hello son, how are you?

Me: I’m perfectly fine, Dad.

Dad: Did you eat?

Me: Yep.

As usual, the conversation ended in five minutes.

---

After I had disconnected the call, I thought – What if it was a call from my best friend, would my response have been the same?

The answer was a big no and I was unable to figure out why. This restlessness drove me to call him again.

Dad: What happened? Are you ok, son?

Me: Yes, I’m fine, Dad. Just, missing you a lot.

He was surprised at first and thought I needed money.

Soon after, I began cracking few jokes (lame ones) to which he laughed his heart out. We talked for straight 40-45 minutes, engaging in topics we had never discussed before.

Strangely enough, I felt like talking to a different person. The person whom I had spent my life with, yet knew so little about.

The blissful conversation ended with a ‛Khush Raho’ (Stay Blessed!) from his side and a wide smile from mine.

---

And so, I realised, not taking your dear ones for granted and making a deliberate effort to know them is something worth consider doing.

I found a really good friend in this process.

Who knows, you may find one too!

What does that word mean

In Imperial China, was there any possible situation where a commoner could meet the Emperor?

In ancient China, common people had the following ways to meet the emperor.

1. The imperial examination. The final stage of the imperial examination is the palace examination, which is personally supervised by the emperor.

2. Assassination. The emperor went out to patrol and ambushed him by the roadside. Even if the assassination fails, before being executed, the emperor will personally question you, who is behind the scenes?

3. Emperor Banquets Centenarians. This is a large-scale honoring and respecting activity for the elderly where the emperor invites centenarians to participate in the royal banquet. But the prerequisite is that you must be able to live healthily to a very old age despite the lack of medical treatment and medicine in ancient times.

4. Become a eunuch. This is not recommended because ancient castration surgery was very risky.

5. Becoming a famous prostitute. Although the emperor had many wives, he would never refuse beautiful women.

Why don’t hotels in Western countries have Chinese breakfasts for their Chinese guests when they used to have Japanese breakfasts for their Japanese guests?

When I was in Malaysia, during breakfast they served dim sum in addition to other traditional breakfast foods and it was very nice. However, Malaysia is a country with a 20% Chinese population. Back here in the West we don’t have a high percentage of Chinese people. There are some Westerners like myself who would enjoy Chinese food, but the majority of people who would eat it would be Chinese people themselves. The lack of demand means there is little incentive to supply it.

What are some of the best pranks you have pulled?

1999. I had a four-year-old Internet advertising agency with 15 employees. A global corporation was buying it.

Weeks before the sale was finalized I had an early morning doctor’s appointment and saw these cups in her bathroom marked URINE SPECIMEN.

I took a bunch of cups, got into the office before any of my employees arrived, left a cup on each person’s desk with a memo that said the buyer required a urine test from everyone in the company before the sale could be approved. A nurse would arrive at noon to test the samples.

One by one they trickled in and proceeded to go batshit. Violation of my rights. They can’t do this. My personal life is my personal life.

I commiserated, but reminded them that if I didn’t sell the company, we’d probably go belly up, and we’d all be out of a job.

Not a lick of work got done all morning. Finally, at noon we all gathered in the reception area, each of us holding a full urine specimen cup.

I spoke to the group. “Guys, I hate this as much as you do.” I looked at my cup. “And I really hate my sample. The color of this piss is terrible. I think I’ll run it through one more time.”

And then I drank it.

I didn’t have to tell them it was Peach Snapple. They knew they’d been had.

15 people. 45 man-hours (and woman-hours) wasted. Pissed away, so to speak. And I loved every second of it. Best. Prank. Ever.

Simply disgusting

What is the most disturbing message ever left on your voicemail?

“Hey guys, it’s Heather. I’m running a bit late, but I should be there in a…..”

There was absolute silence in the room.

“Message received: September 3rd at 11:55 am.”

Not a word was spoken among the three of us listening to the message and none of us could muster anything useful to say afterwards other than a very weak, “save that message”.

It was September 5th. In less than 24 hours, we would be going to Heather’s funeral. Her car had been t-boned by a large truck and she had been killed instantly.

The police report showed that the accident had happened on the 3rd. Slightly before noon.

What could be the implications of China’s major state-owned banks exchanging yuan for U.S. dollars and selling those dollars in spot currency markets?

Try to fully understand China. Unless you do you will always have imaginary Chinese action. Let me help you. To China currency is meant to help transaction and to store wealth not trade currency for currency sake.

To China and to BRICS the SWIFT and its manipulative money trading scheme is just another western conspiracy to destroy countries by a stroke of a pen. China will not and will never play a meaningless game it is stacked against. China. So

it will not internationalise RMB or the Yuan. It will not try to helped prop it currencies artificially and it wanted a real currency value that. Is sustainable trusted. Playing Russian roulette’s with its 1.4 billion people’s wealth is not what China will do.The U.S. dollar used to be able to buy 100 items to day a mere 78 years later it can buy 3 of the same item. That is not good for Americans.

In fact between 1980–2020 Real Chinese income grew 30 times and the U.S. during the same time frame not only not grow. It went back to the 1960 level. So try imagine this. American today is doing worst than their grandpa! China wants its currency to buy roughly the same 78 years later. And an average Chinese have 50 times more Yuan.

What’s the funniest reason you’ve been called in to school to collect your child?

What’s the funniest reason you’ve been called in to school to collect your child?

We were called to get our 16 yo boy. He had drunk a bottle of some alcohol during the lunch break. Then during the relaxation class, he fell asleep. When we got there around 90 minutes later, the high school was closed. We couldn’t get there any earlier as both of us worked around 70kms away.

We discovered from the cleaner he had been taken to the police station as they couldn’t depend on when we would get there.

Unfortunately, the police [ it was a small unit] had been called out to a large bushfire. So they put him in the outside exercise yard. The problem was it didn’t have a roof. When our boy saw us coming he climbed the chain wall and high-tailed it.

He slept at a mate’s place that night. The next day the high school said they were going to have him placed under care. His mum also a school principal said, “ over my dead body”.

We came and collected him. He was terrified his mum was going to hit the roof. Which she did.

We got called by the police to discuss his behaviour as they wanted to know how he had purchased the bottle. We counted with how could you lose our son when he is in your care. In the end nothing became of it and our son grew up and gained some brains.

What happens when you get no action

What are the lessons people most often learn too late in life?

As my first son learned to crawl and then walk, my wife and I played mantras to him, meditated by his side, and lit sacred sandalwood incense around him.

We co-slept and in the day he was always strapped to one of us, skin to skin.

He was breastfed exclusively for nearly a year and then given only organic, vegetarian food.

We didn’t buy him any guns or other toy weapons, only simple wooden and cloth playthings.

He was so peaceful that he radiated a tangible serenity.

Which made her happy—and me—because we wanted him to be calm, loving, and spiritual.

---

He’s seven years old now.

His favorite dish is a medium rare burger, he knows an embarrassing number of juicy curse words, and he’s obsessed with Nerf guns.

He likes to listen to rap music with phat bass lines, he finds talk of spirituality to be boring, and is not in the least bit interested in receiving affection.

But everyone is impressed by how determined, free-spirited, and bright he is.

And between you and me, I’m kind of happy he chose to do his own thing, to be his own being.

We love him more intensely than the blazing of the sun.

---

It took me a long time to realize that you can spend years and years of your life aiming for a particular outcome, just to have things turn out wildly different than you anticipated.

It took me a long time to realize that life is like a wild animal, like my son—fierce and free and beautiful, but ultimately, unpredictable, untamable, and unruly.

And I have the feeling it might take me the rest of my life to fully realize that this built-in uncertainty gives life a unique flavor that, after being acquired, tastes exquisitely delicious.

Why is it mostly old people that go to seafood-based fast food restaurants?

It could be because a lot of older people have tooth problems. An older relative, has dentures, I suggested that we go for steak, and she countered with a fish place, so she could be sure, that she wouldn’t embarrass herself having problems eating a tough steak.

The next time she was over, I had bought tenderloin steaks, and I cooked hers medium, which wasn’t as well done as she would have liked it, but was still pretty tender. Ours were medium rare.

She was upset with me, saying that she wouldn’t be able to eat the steak.

I showed her I could cut mine with my fork. She took one bite and was in love. She hadn’t had a steak she could eat in 10 years. She finished the whole steak, which she had said was too much, when she was looking at it. But once she started eating she couldn’t stop.

Every time we eat at restaurant, we have to make sure there is something on the menu that is soft for her.

So this is one possible reason.

Swarms of drones – kamikazes – attacked USS Thomas Hudner

World Hal Turner

The USS Hudner (DDG-116), an Arleigh Burke-Class Destroyer of the United States Navy, was attacked by a swarm of drones this morning, while patrolling the Red Sea.  The ship sustained no damage or injuries to its crew.

US Central Command (CENTCOM) reported the incident after Houthis in the country of Yemen, took credit for launching the attack.

Houthis are now attacking United States Naval vessels over US Support for Israel, as the Israeli government engages in conflict with the Municipal Government HAMAS of the Gaza Strip.

The Houthis launched swarms of Iranian-made “kamikaze” drones in an unprecedented act of war.

Yemeni rebels who have become a force to be reckoned with in the Middle East, attempted to sink the U.S. vessel.

What happens when you don’t get paid in China

How many Humans existed on the entire earth 60,000 years ago?

Not much more than a few thousand, which is surprisingly small. This is based on our DNA.

Unlike our chimpanzee cousins, all humans today have virtually identical DNA. In fact, one group of chimps can have more genetic diversity than all 8 billion humans.

Our minuscule genetic diversity indicates that at some stage, around 70,000 years ago, the human population dwindled to a very low level — maybe 2,000. In fact, it looks like we came close to extinction.

It was also around this time that our ancestors began migrating out of Africa.

This suggests there were dramatic changes to our traditional environment, possibly caused by the Toba supervolcano eruption 74,000 years ago, the biggest eruption in 2 million years, which left entire regions devastated by ash and climate change.

What is going on with the Republican Party? Why do they seem so unhinged?

It’s 1964. Republicans are sane and intelligent. But they just got handed one of the largest losses in modern history, with LBJ winning the largest popular vote majority since James Monroe in 1820. Desperate for votes, they start pandering to racists who are upset about the Civil Rights Act and desegregation.

It’s 1974. Republicans just had their President outed as a criminal. They need an edge to get back in power. They start pandering to evangelicals, hoping their ability to believe in things they can’t see will make them easy targets for brainwashing.

It’s 1984. Republicans are scoring big points thanks to looking like the tough guys in the Cold War. They double down on the idea of growing the defense budget.

It’s 1994. Republican economic policies are dividing conservatives and just cost them the White House. They launch a 24-hour fake news channel to keep their base uninformed.

It’s 2004. Democrats have nominated a war hero for President and he should easily defeat the Republican incumbent. It’s time to start lying about his war record. Disinformation becomes the new norm.

It’s 2014. The economy is good. The nation is safe. But the President is black. Republicans dig up the 1964 playbook and capitalize on racism in their base.

It’s 2024. Sixty years of tactics have produced Republican voters who are racist, uninformed, misinformed, brainwashed, and violent. Now these people aren’t just voters anymore. They’re in Congress.

The president of the United States

China’s New Subs and Sonars Challenge Supremacy of US Silent Hunter Fleets

18:33 GMT 21.11.2023 (Updated: 18:37 GMT 21.11.2023)

The People’s Liberation Army Navy (PLAN) surpassed the US Navy in total number of warships in late 2021. Technologically too, China has made major strides, including in the area of submarine construction and detection. These advances have sparked concerns from observers that America’s powerful fleets could be left dead in the water in a crisis.

The PLAN’s military and technological prowess against the US Navy in the field of submarine construction and anti-submarine warfare is progressing apace, and the “era of total US submarine dominance” over the People’s Republic of China is reaching its end.

That’s the conclusion reached by one of America’s top cited business newspapers in a piece focused on the Asian nation’s scientific and industrial advances for naval warfare. China, the paper pointed out, is gradually “narrowing” the gap between itself and the United States in the highly complex fields of submarine technology and undersea detection.

These developments not only threaten the Pentagon’s regional strategy of hemming China into its home ports, but could challenge US naval supremacy globally over the long term.

Earlier this year, for instance, research by the US Naval War College’s China Maritime Studies Institute pointed to Chinese advances in efficient nuclear reactors, quiet-running pump-jet propulsion systems and internal quieting devices, the latter based on “imitative innovation” of Russian technology, predicting that the PLAN’s latest nuclear-powered subs will be much harder to track than before.

Additionally, analyses of satellite photos of the Huludao Shipyard in Liaoning, northeastern China taken last year showed the construction of sections of submarine hulls larger than anything US analysts have ever seen in a Chinese sub, along with what seemed to be plans to increase production capacity.

US media citing leaked US Navy intelligence already sounded the alarm about China’s impressive shipbuilding capacity this past fall, which at 23.2 million tons per year, compared with 100,000 tons per year in the US, gives the People’s Republic the ability to build warships at a rate some 200 times greater than the US in a pinch.

On top of that, the PLAN’s rapid construction of a vast network of underwater sensors in the South China Sea and other areas along the Chinese coast known as the “Underwater Great Wall”, to look out for sub, surface warship and aerial activity, means that the Pentagon will find it more difficult to place its warships, subs and aircraft in areas around the Asian nation. The Underwater Great Wall’s construction is reportedly nearing its completion, and includes a vast network of passive and active sonar sensors, plus remote controlled underwater and surface drones which can look out for enemy activity.

China is reportedly also “getting better” at finding silent-running US attack and cruise missile subs sneaking around near its home waters, combining buoy and drone-based monitoring with the use of patrol aircraft and helicopters, for example.

In addition are the PLAN’s growing number of exercises with Russia, which, it can be assumed not only increases the Chinese Navy’s ability to coordinate with its northern neighbor in the event of an emergency, but allows it to learn from the Russian Navy’s half century-plus year experience as a major global naval power rivaled only to the US.

“The implications for the US and our Pacific allies will be profound,” former US Navy officer Christopher Carlson said, pointing to the headaches the US Navy will face, and the additional resources it will need, to locate and keep track of China’s new generation of quiet-running nuclear subs.

Strategically, the outlet noted, maneuvers that the US once took for granted, like the ability to approach close China’s home shores, will now no longer be a given, with the PLAN’s nuclear-powered attack subs able to pick off approaching American warships before they could reach Taiwan in a crisis, for example.

On top of that is the Chinese sub-based ballistic missile threat to the US homeland –a threat Washington has long been used to meting out, but not experiencing itself, in relation to the Asian giant.

“Finding a boat this quiet is going to be really hard,” Carlson said of the Chinese sub threat, predicting the new Chinese boats will probably be about as quiet as the Project 971 Shchuka-B (NATO reporting name Akula, or “Shark”) class fourth generation nuclear-powered attack subs which the Soviet Union and then Russia started fielding in the 1980s and 1990s.

China’s fleet of 79 submarines includes at least 16 nuclear-powered attack and ballistic missile subs, including six Type 093 (NATO reporting name Shang class) attack subs and six Type 094 (NATO reporting name Jin) ballistic missile boats operating “near-continuous” patrols between Hainan Island and the South China Sea. But Carlson warned that the Asian nation could build up to triple the current US rate averaging 1.2 subs per year.

Costly as Aircraft Carriers, Difficult to Build

“Submarine-building is the pinnacle of technological excellence in economics and industry, and only a few countries have mastered the technologies which China has now broken into – France, Britain, the Soviet Union/Russia, and the United States,” Vasily Dandykin, a veteran Russian military analyst and retired Russian Navy Captain 1stRank, told Sputnik.

Several factors account for the US’ slowing pace when it comes to the construction of new submarines, according to the observer, starting with Washington’s decision to rest on its laurels after the end of the Cold War, to the drop in the number of high-class specialists in the field.

“The downtime” in the US’ submarine-related programs resulted from “complacency after the collapse of the Soviet Union,” when “not just America, but also Europe rested on their laurels,” according to Dandykin. “The Americans have the world’s largest military budget, which exceeds those of all other countries in the world. That means that somewhere they got carried away with such gigantic and expensive projects which did not justify their cost,” the analyst said, pointing to out of control spending on novelties like the $8 billion-per ship Zumwalt class of destroyers.

“There were a lot of such projects that sucked up a lot of money. And now it turns out that all of these experiments boil down to the fact that they’re 10 years behind Russia in the creation of a new fourth-generation strategic nuclear submarine,” made possible, according to the analyst, thanks to the backlog of revolutionary Soviet sub designs that Russian builders have been able to develop and build on.

“The ‘downtime’ that occurred had an impact in this area, not just with submarines, but the construction of the surface fleet, the entire American fleet. Here, without a doubt, China’s pace has been impressive, first and foremost in terms of the construction of large ships for the surface fleet. But I think they will push themselves and try to build up their nuclear submarine fleet as quickly as possible,” Dandykin predicted.

As far as China’s subs themselves go, Dandykin pointed out that for the moment, the majority of the PLAN’s fleet still consists of diesel-electric subs, and for them to reach the same technological level as the US, as they have already done when it comes to ships like universal landing ships and destroyers, will take time. The PLAN’s current nuclear-powered ballistic missile-launching subs belong to the second generation at best, in the retired naval officer’s estimation, and the newest efforts are aimed at the creation of third-generation vessels.

Accordingly, Dandykin believes US efforts to hype up the “Chinese threat” are “a little disingenuous,” and designed mainly to lobby for the allocation of even more resources for US sub-building efforts – a titanic effort equivalent, more or less, to the construction of an aircraft carrier in both technological and financial terms.

What does it feel like to be abroad but feel more at home than when you are back home?

Surreal. Uncanny. Deja vu. That’s how I felt as I looked down on Southeast Asia from my seat aboard an airplane. The feelings intensified the longer I was there. While my friends made me feel so very welcome, even in my time alone the feeling never left me.

I began the first leg of my long journey back home by crying into my teacup in a cafe in Changi Airport. My heart felt heavy. I was glad to go home to my daughter but if she’d been with me on the trip I’m not sure I’d have returned to the U.S. willingly.

I have said that when I die I want my ashes to be scattered in China, because America is the place of my birth but China holds my heart. There’s something about the Asian region that draws me deeply. I have no Asian background or ancestry so I can’t rationalize it. It’s just how I felt.

I was just jokin’

Have you ever seen a mass exodus after a respected employee quit or got fired?

I was fired after 11 years in a PR firm. I never clicked with the owner, and the feeling was mutual. I loved my colleagues, got along well with everyone, and consider them friends to this day.

I had just come off of a very trying time related to a proposal I was writing, had slept little, was burned out and mentioned to a colleague that I wasn’t sure I belonged there anymore.

Soon afterward, the boss took me into his office and said nobody wanted to work with me and that we had just lost a client that reduced our budget. His second in command sat through this with his head in his hands the whole time. He helped me clean out my office the next day.

There were other things going on at the firm. The owner was advancing in age and had promised a succession plan. He never delivered. One by one, after my firing, everyone quit. His firm, started in the mid-80s and one of the most prominent in the city, was done.

Two people told me that my firing was the trigger that made people start thinking about whether they wanted to be there anymore. I can’t take the credit or the blame for what happened, but the exodus was fast and devastating.

Correct attitude to have

What seemingly good celebrity is actually a jerk?

The public image of a celebrity can often be quite different from their true character. Take Ellen Degeneres, for example. On her show and in interviews, she appears to be a lovable, down-to-earth aunt-like figure. However, there have been numerous accounts from staff and crew members claiming that she is actually a nightmare to work with and a terrible person. So, which version is the truth?

Then there’s Sean Penn, who was once in a relationship with Madonna. It has been alleged that he kidnapped and raped her during the 80s. Additionally, Penn has been involved in some truly awful activities throughout his life. On the flip side, he is also the CEO of a large charity and engages in humanitarian work.

Another celebrity, Mark Wahlberg, is often seen as an extraordinary role model and a decent guy. However, it is important to note that he blinded a Vietnamese man during a fight and is a high school dropout. Please note that the mention of being a high school dropout does not imply that it automatically makes someone a terrible person, but it is worth considering when evaluating their status as a role model.

Tim Allen, known for his lovable and funny dad roles, has a dark side. Despite making people laugh out loud with his jokes, he has been described as a severe asshole who disrespects those around him. Furthermore, he was caught smuggling a kilo of cocaine in Kalamazoo, Michigan, and served time for it.

On the other hand, we have Danny Trejo, who was once involved in drug running for a cartel and had a long history of violence and addiction. However, he has transformed himself into a humble and honest man who actively tries to steer kids away from his former lifestyle. In person, he is charming and genuine.

How might rising interest rates in the US affect China’s growth potential and FDI flows?

Nothing.

Zero effect.

Slave nations like Germany and Japan wrap themselves around US and western economic orbit. And the U.S. increase interest it destroy their banks and industry. Not China. China is in its own stable orbit. Today the U.S. interest is between 3–5% and China stays under 1% or so. It do its own thing.

US banks are dropping like flies. China’s bank is loaded with Cash. Chinese citizen on average save 35% of their income in Chinese banks. The U.S. citizens meanwhile saved in average less than 4%. So every year the Chinese add another 6–7 trillion dollars into their wealth and funds.

On FDI if the west reduce other nations made up for it and China’s own investment is so humongous. FDI from west means nothing.

This cheating event did not work out well

What are the influences of food on our culture?

I grew up in the USA. In high school, the lunch period was 25 minutes. On a normal day I washed down three peanut butter sandwiches and half a dozen cookies with a quart of milk and headed to the break room.

At least my parents enforced a family sit-down dinner, though it didn’t last long either.

My eating behaviour in college and working part time jobs was not any better, though the food choices were smarter and more varied.

When I started working in sales after college, I graduated to fast food eaten in the car.

At restaurants, servers were all over me, trying to turn the table in 45 minutes or less.

For me, eating was like putting gas in my car. Get it over and move on to the rest of life.

Then I moved to Germany. It was a shock. The canteen served excellent full hot meals and everyone took their time eating, chatting (but not about work), and taking turns buying coffee for the table.

It was impossible to get out of a sit-down restaurant in under 90 minutes without pushing the staff.

Dinner at friends was a four-hour affair.

I learned to love food and the community of sharing it with others. It wasn’t uncommon for less formal outdoor restaurants to seat me with other diners. I met dozens of fascinating people in that manner.

Ten years later I moved to France and learned that the French take mealtime even more seriously than the Germans. Employers even subsidise the canteen or pay part of the meal vouchers for each worker.

I think this question might be better phrased if it asked “What are the influences of culture on food?”

While the food does vary from country to country, I have little trouble in Europe to eat exactly what I ate in the USA. That’s why I don’t think it’s the food that matters.

Instead I think it’s the value people place on taking the time to savour their meals and those they share them with.

Zelenogradsk: What does a Russian city of CATS look like?

Nov 09 2023

Anna Sorokina

They are literally everywhere: occupying benches at observation decks, sitting next to tourists at restaurant terraces, strolling along pedestrian streets and (alright, fine) allowing you to take photos of them. Let’s pay them a little visit?

You can definitely call the small city of Zelenogradsk (pop. 16,000) in Kaliningrad Region the “cat capital” of Russia. Everything there is dedicated to these furry animals, from souvenirs to… traffic lights!

The many cats of this city will gladly show a tourist the best photo spots (and the best lunch spots!). But, how did it come to this?

Zelenogradsk (Cranz until 1946) is an old resort city at the shore of the Baltic Sea. Cats usually like to settle in such seaside towns, closer to fishermen, fish and vacationers. But, in Zelenogradsk, they have become a real attraction of the city.

According to legend, centuries ago, cats saved the city from rodents that were destroying their food supply and spreading disease. Caring for stray cats is the locals’ way of expressing gratitude.

Cats have always been living in Zelenogradsk. But, it was only recently that the city itself became the “cat capital”. It all started with the Murarium Museum in an old 1905 water tower. Local inhabitant Irina Klochkova decided to set up an exhibition hall for her cat statuette collection in the unused tower in 2012.

Real cats also live in the museum, with ginger-furred ‘Semyon Semyonovich’ chief among them. He became the prototype for the first museum souvenirs. ‘Murarium’ gained a lot of popularity among tourists; soon after, a lot of everything “cat-themed” began to appear in the city.

As soon as you visit, you’ll immediately notice an incredible amount of cat graffiti on buildings. Souvenir stores, on every corner it seems, sell anything from keychains and magnets to shopping bags and mugs with cats on them.

The city’s central street, Kurortny Prospekt, even has mini-benches for cats, little traffic lights with flashing cats, as well as vending machines where you can buy cat food. The city administration even has the position of cat chief, a cat caretaker. Their responsibilities include feeding and taking care of cats.

And for those tourists who decide to have lunch on an open terrace of any cafe, just know you won’t be able to so in peace and quiet! The local cats will always investigate and will not be against the idea of sharing a meal with you.

By the way, there are plenty of dogs in the city, as well, but they seemingly maintain a neutrality with the cats. There are literally no fights or altercations to speak of these days.

Why are the Chinese not interested in Western democracy?

There are two approaches to an answer, one superficial.

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I’ll begin with the superficial.

Democracy, or one man one vote, is practiced by the Chinese. They have found the process is good at selecting leaders from small groups that work or live closely together. In fact, this is how the President is selected among the Politburo, and so on.

Unfortunately, one man one vote can and has been hijacked, particularly if money and power enters the equation. There are innumerable tales of village/town leadership seizing power through the “democratic process” and terrorizing “voters” for years on end.

When groups grow too large, voting among strangers can lead to undesirable outcomes.

That’s the modern Chinese experience.

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Unfortunately, “Western democracy” isn’t just voting systems. It is a system of values and beliefs built on the foundation of western prosperity. For the past 5–600 years, it has been the absolute dominance in technology that has kept the West on top. That is how the top 12% of humanity today maintain radically different standards of living from the rest of the 88.

Until the emergence of China, only willing acolytes of the “Western model” made the leap into the first world, leaving has-beens by the wayside. All of them, to a fault, adopted Western-style constitutions, governments, legislation and thoroughly reformed society, in order to qualify for membership into the “globalized world”. In return, their economies boomed, powered by export-led demand from the first world.

Along came China, which is distinctly different, especially in the post-Soviet age of “the end of history”. Unfortunately, Communist China has succeeded wildly, way beyond the imagination of the “last man”.

Herein lies the rub. Chinese leaders had enough self confidence decades ago that the Western highway to prosperity wasn’t exclusive. Today, Chinese society is increasingly convinced their leaders were right, because they are living the best times in the sum history of Chinese civilization, a realized boast that reverberates through 4 millennia and >100 generations.

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Western prosperity in the 21st century is no longer the shining city on the hill, cities of the future one can only dream of being teleported back home. A Chinese tourist visiting NYC, London, Paris and Berlin will be nonplussed by the sights, and perhaps repulsed by the smell and experience. Chinese cities have the same modern hardware, and services is rapidly catching up. And Chinese cities are evolving rapid improvement in quality of life metrics, while the west is stagnating, or worse, regressing.

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The Chinese will go, that’s “Western democracy”, “in God We Trust”, and “all men created equal”?

Thanks, but no thanks.

Communism has our vote, because we live and breathe its outcomes.

Ukr Hard Day: Avdeyevka Cauldron, Kherson Bridgehead Cut Off, Wilders Wins; Biden BRICS Gaza Plan

As a doctor, what’s the saddest experience you’ve had with a patient?

I once talked to an acid attack victim.

She came to the surgery OPD by mistake on a day when our Plastic Surgery OPD was closed.

She had her face covered with a dupatta. I was immediately aware that she had some disfigurement that she was trying to conceal but it was only when I saw her treatment card that I realised what the reason behind it was.

I read the entire card and slowly looked up at her. She was looking at me with one eye while she kept the rest of her face covered.

“I was asked to come after 4 weeks. Here I am.” She told me quietly.

“Yes, I see it written here, ma’m, but our plastic surgery OPDs are on Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays. I am afraid, you’ll have to come back tomorrow.”

She closed her eyes and took a deep breath.

“Can’t you or the doctors here do anything about this?”

“We can but we are not plastic surgeons. We are not experts and we are not the best people to help you.”

“No one can help me, doctor. You know it.”

I had no answer to that.

“If there’s anything else I can do for you…” I said.

“What can you do? My life is ruined. All I do is travel between my home, the hospital and the court. The last few of weeks my life have been hell. The pain has been unbearable. I can’t even look into the mirror anymore. What do you think you CAN do? Can you get me to look like before?”, she said, her eye moist and a hint of desperation in her voice.

I was trying hard to act professional.

I wanted to say that I was sorry that this happened to her. I wanted to tell her that I felt a burning hatred for the person or persons who did this to her. I wanted to tell her that she shouldn’t give up because her life wasn’t over.

Yet, I didn’t say anything. Everything that came into my head began to sound empty as I was about to say it out loud. My words all seemed so woefully inadequate to offer any kind of assurance to her.

That’s why I was trying to be calm and professional. No pity, no sadness, no anger. I was just trying to do what I was there for: my job which was to try and help her.

“I’ll try to call the Plastic Surgery resident to see if he can come here and take a look at you. I can’t promise that he will but I will give him a call.”

“Thank you.” She said quietly.

Nodding, I took out my phone to call the resident.

“I shouldn’t have spoken like that to you.” She said, looking straight at me.

“It’s completely fine.” I said immediately. The last thing I wanted was for her to feel bad for me.

“No, it’s not. I know what it feels like to be spoken to like this, especially if you haven’t done anything to deserve it.”

“Really, ma’m, you do not need to apologise at all. It’s okay-”

“You know, what hurts the most? Before this I was recently-”

Married? Did the husband abandon her? That was the first thought that came to my head.

“-promoted. I was a receptionist in a famous hotel. I was good at my job. People speak to us rudely all the time but I was really good at handling them. There wasn’t a single complaint against me to my manager in the one and a half years that I had the job.”

She paused, looking down at her feet.

“It’s all gone now. They won’t let me work with this…face. It doesn’t matter how well I handle our customers if they can’t handle my face.”, she said, in a voice that was so matter-of-fact that my heart felt like it was being stabbed.

This was a woman who had been serious about her job. She had been excited about her future. She had been independent. The first thing she told me about her life was that she had lost the job she had worked so hard at.

I don’t know why but this case affected me so much more than other cases. Medically, there exist even more severe cases in which acid attacks have caused complete blindness, paralysis or in the inability to eat or swallow.

I know, of course, that you can’t quantify suffering and everyone has their own battles but this one…this one made me want to stop doing my work and go cry in a corner.

I forced myself to look away and called the resident. I managed to convince him to come and examine her.

“He’ll be here in fifteen minutes. Please wait outside.”, I said with difficulty because I felt a lump in my throat.

“Thank you.”, she said softly and left the room.

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When you throw acid on someone’s face and they survive the attack, you take from them much of what we consider “life”. You take away choices, opportunities, self-respect and throw them into a world of such suffering that they have never known before.

Many victims say that death is preferable.

I don’t think I’ll be able to argue with them.

What is the best case of “You just picked a fight with the wrong person” that you’ve witnessed?

My grandfather was once a lightweight boxing champ. He was healthy most of his life, but like everyone, he grew old. At 90 years old, though, he still liked to go dancing. He took his girlfriend to their elder community’s weekly dance. We went to join them for dinner and just visit them a while.

While I was up getting them plates from the buffet, two scummy men came in. They had been drinking and were looking for some old people to bully – no joke. They were in their late 30s/early 40s. They stopped at my grandpa’s table and started talking about his girlfriend. My grandpa stood up and told them to leave. I looked over and saw this jerk spit on the floor and shove my 90 year old grandpa.

I saw my grandpa stumble backwards against the wall, and I dropped the food tray and started moving towards him. It felt like slow motion.

Before I could get there, I saw my grandpa push off the wall and punch the guy square in the jaw. The man landed on his butt and slid backwards nearly all the way across the room! No one could believe what we saw, especially not the two creeps. His friend went over and helped him up, and everyone watched them leave with their tails between their legs.

I finally went back and got the food for them, and we sat and talked about what happened while they ate. After a bit, the two idiots came back with the police. They pointed by grandpa out to the officers.

The police didn’t believe their story, and we all acted like we didn’t know what they were talking about.

I sure miss that wonderful, strong old man.

Is it true that an increasing number of Chinese people are preferring domestic tourism? If so, what are the reasons?

In last two decades hundreds of millions of Chinese have travelled overseas. Annually about 130 million Chinese travel outside of their country. So by now most of them may have realised that most of the rest of the world is very backward and not as advanced as they used to think.

And secondly they have their own continent sized country to travel and explore and will probably take a lifetime to explore fully. And every kind of tourist related attractions are within their own country be it tourist spots, beaches, deserts, cultural and historical sites, valleys, grasslands, snow and glaciers means in short every experience and to say the least their excellent infrastructure that makes travelling within China indeed a cakewalk.

May be that’s why.

Man’s worst fear

I tricked my Muslim coworker into eating pork (bacon) in a lasagna. How can I tell him so he sees how hilarious and innocent it is?

If a Muslim unknowingly eats pork it isn’t a terrible problem. That doesn’t mean they won’t be upset though.

Regardless of how they feel about the pork, they will probably be more upset with you. Letting them unknowingly eat pork as a joke is a dick move of the highest order. I would recommend that you never tell them, if you want to maintain the relationship you have with them. If you tell them and laugh about it, no one is going to blame them for hating you forever. Others might join their camp.

Like I said, it’s a dick move, so proceed at your own risk.

A purr-fect neighbor

If Earth got flung out of the solar system and became a rogue planet, what measures would we take to survive, whether or not those would actually succeed?

Hoo boy. This is going to be one rough ride for humanity.

If we act fast, there is a chance that our species might survive for the long term, but we’re going to have to do things quickly. As soon as the Earth starts to move away from the Sun, things are going to cool off. A lot depends on exactly the trajectory, but even with a conservative estimate, we’re facing a snowball Earth scenario within a matter of years, when the surface of the planet can no longer support liquid water. It won’t take long for everything living on the surface to die.

However, not all hope is lost. The oceans will freeze from the surface downward, and as they freeze over they will in fact insulate the deeper layers. It could take hundreds of thousands of years before the oceans freeze solid, meaning some life may still manage to hold on in the deeper parts of the oceans for millennia, particularly where there is active volcanism going on, keeping things (relatively) warm. In theory, given enough time, we might be able to construct underwater habitats in the deep oceans as a refuge for humanity.

Another option is to simply go underground. On average, the temperature increases by about 25C for every kilometer we go down into the ground. Even when the surface temperatures have plummeted to -200C (when we’ve wandered out past Pluto), we “only” have to dig down a handful of kilometers before we can bask in the relative heat from the heart of our planet.

That heat from the planet’s core is what might ultimately provide the salvation for the species. While the rest of the energy sources we have available to us are ultimately based on solar radiation and will be forfeit once we’ve drifted from the Sun, our planet’s core is powered by radioactive decay and will keep on cooking for billions of years to come. We can harness this either directly via fission reactors, or indirectly through geothermal energy sources.

So here’s the scenario we might enact to provide for the continuation of humanity.

First, we determine what capacity we have for tunneling down into the crust and excavating areas large enough to create underground settlements. Perhaps the Boring Company will be in high demand in this scenario! Governments across the world pool their resources and a number of candidate sites around the globe are selected. Access to existing geothermal energy sources might be a good starting point.

Then we start digging. Temporary “camps” are excavated at shallower depths while digging proceeds ahead for future movements. In the meantime, each of these future colonies is prepared with resources that they’ll need to survive. Deep underground, some of the challenges will be oxygen and clean water; however, with artificial sunlight and proper preparation it should be possible to grow crops even underground. We’ll probably have to say goodbye to eating meat as raising animals for food won’t be an efficient use of resources, though we might keep some animals around for the sake of having animals.

At some point there’s going to be some kind of selection process for who gets to go down and survive. This won’t be pretty. Most of us will be left on the surface to freeze to death. But once it’s done, the selected groups can descend into the bowels of the Earth and begin a new subterranean existence.

Would it succeed? It’s hard to say. They have to dig deep enough, and that presents dangers in and of itself. Colonies could be destroyed by seismic activity that collapses them. In those kinds of close quarters, a disease outbreak could prove fatal to the whole group. Issues with food supply or water supply could doom a group. There are many ways in which any underground colony could fail, and it is almost a given some of them would.

But with enough luck, persistence and hard work, some of them might make it, and over the generations adapt to this new lifestyle. Maybe they’d even thrive to the point they could send excursions back out to the surface, exploring the frozen wasteland, travelling across the ice to visit other underground colonies. Maybe even once again find ways to build ships to leave the planet and try to find someplace nicer to take the family, so to speak.

From the Bayou Crawfish Louisianne

Yield: 4 to 6 generous servings

Ingredients

• 2 tablespoons (1/4 stick) butter
• 1/2 cup chopped andouille sausage
• 3/4 cup chopped bell pepper (can mix the colors)
• 1/2 large onion, chopped
• 1 tablespoon Italian seasoning
• 1/2 to 3/4 cup whipping cream
• 1 pound crawfish tails
• 1 quart peanut oil
• 4 to 6 catfish fillets (2 to 3 ounces each)
• Egg wash (egg white, water, milk)
• Seasoned flour
• Seasoning to taste
• Cajun seasoning, pepper, red pepper and garlic powder

Instructions

1. In a small saucepan, melt butter. Add andouille, peppers, onions and Italian seasoning and sauté until tender (about 5 minutes.) Add mushrooms just before completion.
2. Add whipping cream, and reduce the sauce over medium heat.
3. Add crawfish, and cook for 3 minutes. Adjust seasoning.
4. Heat oil in a large saucepan.
5. Dredge fish in egg wash and then season with flour.
6. Fry until golden brown on both sides.
7. Pour crawfish mixture over catfish.
8. Garnish with parsley and onion tops.

So very British

https://www.youtube.com/shorts/y8lMSMoqbps?feature=share

What are the ways to become a high quality man?

1. Make decisions for yourself and do not follow the opinions or actions of others.
2. Have a clear sense of who you are and what you stand for.
3. Spend time reflecting on your thoughts and emotions and deeply understand yourself.
4. Be capable of taking care of yourself and do not rely on others for support.
5. Enjoy spending time alone and find it more fulfilling than being with others.
6. Have a few close friends or family members and do not rely on the need for an extensive social network.
7. Enjoy exploring ideas and concepts and be comfortable contemplating complex topics.
8. Do not seek validation from others and be comfortable relying on yourself.
9. Have a unique perspective and approach to life and be confident going against the crowd.
10. Do not conform to societal norms or expectations and march to the beat of your drum.

The Chinese warship sonar incident

This mature and analytical write-up by John Menadue, November 23 is very constructive and logical.

John Menadue is the Founder and Editor in Chief of Pearls and Irritations. He was formerly Secretary of the Department of Prime Minister and Cabinet under Gough Whitlam and Malcolm Fraser, Ambassador to Japan, Secretary of the Department of Immigration and CEO of Qantas.

…

“What a feast of anti-China stories we have had again from the Coalition and our media over the incident between HMAS Toowoomba and a Chinese PLA-N destroyer.

The whole issue really looks to be overblown – and seeded by some in the Sinophobia school who are worried about where Prime Minister Albanese and Foreign Minister Penny Wong may be headed. The idea of “stabilisation” scares them, so they react by promoting some destabilisers.

The proposition that the Chinese warship was directed by Beijing – let alone President Xi – to initiate such “aggressive” action beggars belief. Like the ‘spy’ balloon exercise, where it seems clear enough that President Xi initially knew little about the whole thing.

Our ‘spooks’ depend on the CIA for about 90% of their overseas information and the Pentagon is building a network in our Department of Defence. I would very much doubt whether Albanese and Wong really know what ‘information’ the CIA and the Pentagon are feeding into our spooks.

The US expects that a pliant ally like Australia will do what it is told. It is concerned at recent events and prefers that we do not stabilise our relations with China. So this incident is a great opportunity for some destabilisation. And our poorly informed media tag along as always.

Given the unsurprising PLA comments the chances of misunderstanding the message or even miscommunication would have to rate high. If the PLA ship had been shadowing the RAN ship, which then decided to stop dead in the water to check for nets, would the Commander of the PLA ship not be a bit suspicious about what the RAN was up to and activate some of his intel alerts including special sonar to try to find out more? In any event presumably he would have had some of his sonar devices running while he was sailing anyway? Even if the PLA just happened on the RAN in the middle of the sea (electronically of course) would its initial reaction not be one of suspicion?

We probably will never get the real story of the actual communications between the two ships, but language problems cannot be excluded.

But Albanese and Marles (again and again) have been panicked into hasty responses for which we will pay. Marles should have tried to hose things down, but he invariably sings from the US song sheet. Albanese should stick to the line of not commenting in detail on his private conversations with world leaders. Blinken did this repeatedly over questions about the Xi-Biden talk. If necessary, the government can call in the Chinese Ambassador at Secretary level to make the point.

It is strange why Marles would want to play this up right now. The incident was not in the SCS but in Japan’s EEZ heading towards Japan. This could be in the contested area of the East China Sea, south of Okinawa.

It is also not clear what UN sanctions RAN was monitoring unless they were part of the regular monitoring of UN sanctions against North Korea. We have been doing that in the Sea of Japan further north.

These incidents should be sorted out by military to military communications and not as a stick for those who want to destabilise our improving relationship with China.

We would be more concerned if this incident occurred in waters adjacent to Australia and not in waters adjacent to China, which is already encircled by scores of US military bases. China would understandably be very sensitive about what happens in its proximity.

In any event, this incident is minor compared with the aggressive things we do that are hostile to China. RAAF P8 aircraft operating out of the Philippines drop Sonar buoys in the SCS to monitor Chinese submarines. This is not for the defence of Australia but to support the US in a possible conflict with China over Taiwan.

Our media have shown no interest in this issue. It does not fit the Western ‘China threat’ narrative that our White Man’s Media works so hard to construct and maintain, and so is ignored.”

I stuff guys with cars…

Have you ever witnessed an “I demand to see the manager” moment?

If you’ve worked retail long enough, even if you’re amazing, you have one of these.

I work retail pharmacy. I had a woman come up to the sales counter with her adult daughter, wanting to buy a large quantity of Sudafed, but within the legal limit. Both of them were planning to buy, and they happened to mention that they were buying it for the woman’s mother, both of them. This is illegal, as in my state you must purchase it for yourself or your minor child. You actually sign an electronic document stating so.

I apologize to the women and tell them I can’t complete the transaction, and explain why, that it is against state and federal law.

Immediate attitude, along the lines of “Who do you think you are, you low born classless person to tell me and my daughter, with our bleach blonde hair and snooty attitudes ‘no!’”

The mother demands to speak with the manager, who isn’t there, we just have a staff pharmacist who’s witnessed the whole thing. She tells the woman that I can complete the sale.

I stare at her for a second before asking the pharmacist if she intends to pay my legal fees to reinstate my pharmacy tech liscense, and tell the pharmacist that if she wants to process the transaction she can, but that I WILL NOT.

She demands my register login and codes, because she’s not a regular pharmacist at my store. I refuse to give them to her, as that is a fireable offense.

The customer is staring at us, red faced and ready to burst, and demands I listen to the pharmacist, then demands I page store management when I explain that the pharmacist cannot compel me to break the law.

I page store management, and my favorite assistant manager comes over and asks what’s going on. By this point, the woman is using abusive language, and exclaims “This f*ggot won’t sell me Sudafed that is for me!”

At that point the manager raises an eyebrow and tells the woman she’s going to have to move her car.

Woman asks why.

“Because our parking is for customers only. You need to leave now. Our customers know they can’t talk to people like that.”

The woman throws a shrieking fit, shoving over a display of medication… which her adult daughter stops to pick up, apologizing the whole time.

The pharmacist in question got written up by corporate for an Ethics violation, and when my Pharmacy Manager told me I should just turn my ears off and not listen to conversations at the register and do my job, he got an Ethics violation that has left him stuck as a pharmacy manager.

The woman emailed the corporate office, and I got to see the reply which was basically ‘We’re sorry you had that experience, but our stores are committed to following state and federal law’ and they attached the laws in question, highlighted.

It was nice to be vindicated and defended for once, instead of thrown under that well known bus.

Reality in the USA

US Congress unanimously approved the Patent Restriction Act. All of China’s patents are at risk of invalidation overnight. Huawei’s 20000+ patents could be deemed invalid. All countries at risk as the US can claim a national security threat. Fair?

With China’s manufacturing power and the engi eers’ abilities of learning and copying, good luck to the US.

All US patents will be nulled by China and Russia as, and the US will lose much more than Huawei would do.

This is not only on Qualcomm, TI, AMD, intel but also hit huge on the pharmaceutical companies.

China and its engineers are waiting for the bill passed and now all the knowledge would be shared without any loyalty across mankind. Nice job the US.

I just don’t beat the shit out of you…

What’s something you can’t believe you had to explain to an American tourist or as a tourist visiting America?

I was in a hospital, here at Rome, to visit a friend, and when I was going away I saw two American girls, one could hardly walk because she had fell and hurted badly her leg. I helped them to call someone to bring a wheel chair and they went to emergency. I went with them to help because they didn’t speak italian well. I asked why they didn’t call for an ambulance and they said they didn’t want t to spend too much money. They were worried about how much they would have to pay at the hospital too. I explained them, in Italy, the ambulance is free, and so the hospital. Even if she would have to stay there for days or weeks. No one in Italy could dare to ask a girl with a broken leg for money. Nobody could leave her without medical care even if the didn’t have money.

They couldn’t believe me . They continued asking if the hospital was going to send bills later. If they could pay later in installments.

The girls wanted to ask the administrative employee too, because they wanted to be sure. He gave them the same answer and they were very surprised.

Later the girls left the hospital, one had a cast on her leg but they had big, beautiful smiles!

Loyalty and Respect

What is the most absurd thing you’ve been charged for on a bill?

Not me, but my mother. She was visiting the US for a ski holiday in New England and had a bad fall that resulted in a broken bone. As a result, she had to spend a bit of time in a hospital. Her stay was fortunately paid for by Canadian health insurance; can’t imagine how US citizens who don’t have or can’t afford coverage manage to pay for their care.

Anyway, I was curious to see what it cost after she got home, so she showed me the detailed bill. The total was shockingly high, no surprise, but one thing caught my eye. She’d been invoiced for 3X “helically wound cellulose absorbent matrix units” at $48 each. Curious, I contacted the hospital to ask what these could be. Can you guess?

They turned out to be rolls of bog-standard toilet paper, the number she was tracked as having consumed during her stay.

Amazing.

Pretty good

What’s the fastest you’ve wiped a smirk off of someone’s face?

Not myself but a teacher at my school.

This was a Church of England (Christian) secondary school (ages 11-18) in the late ‘80s and the dress code was quite strict. Among the many rules was one that boys weren’t allowed to have long hair.

There was this old-fashioned teacher (Mr. Barabell) who’d been teaching there for ~30 years already by that point and was well-known for being strict but fair.

Anyway, there was this one boy (Luke) who decided that he wanted to grow long hair and he wasn’t going to let a stupid school rule stop him, and so he just let it grow. Initially he started getting comments from teachers about being “scruffy” etc. but eventually the situation came to a head in Mr. Barabell’s class:

A confrontation begins with the teacher telling Luke off— “There are school standards to maintain, “ and, “Does he think that he’s special, ” and so on. Well Luke—smart alec that he was—has a pre-prepared answer ready to go:

“But sir, Jesus had long hair didn’t he?“

As this point the class is completely silent waiting for a response, but instead of answering Mr. Barabell says, “Right, everyone come with me now,” and he turns and exits the class room. We all follow, including Luke, wondering what on Earth is going on.

Eventually we reach the school swimming pool and gather around. Then Mr. Barabell turns to Luke, points to the swimming pool and says, “Walk!”.

Luke is just standing there kind of shaking his head (knowing that he’s defeated) and the whole rest of the class is cracking up.

The teacher finishes with, “When you can walk on water, you can have long hair at school.”

Game. Set. Match.

Smart Kid

Why can’t Americans get access to the Chinese electric car market?

Americans foolishly screamed and shout that they are the leader of the free world without ever questioning if it is even remotely true or not! Please don’t be angry or upset if I help you guys since I understand you can pretend to be free or even dare says you are ordained by god to spread democracy and freedom but you Americans are one of the least free country on earth.

Let me help you good American. So first I like to explain how unfree you guys are.

35% of you cannot get health care when you fall sick! The most basic of freedom is the freedom to see a doctor and get cure when you fall sick. At least 100 million Americans don’t have this basic of basics of freedom.

Next 1 million Americans are homeless and don’t have another basic of basics of freedom. The freedom to have a roof over their head.! They have to live in makeshift tents on the streets.

20% of Americans don’t have 500 dollars to their name and don’t know where their next meal is coming from! Surely everyone must have the freedom to have a hot meal to stay alive!

USA with about 4% of world population has 25% of the worlds prisoners population! Think about this my American friends, prisoners are certainly. Not free. Many of them coloured people thrown into jail for the slightest reason. How on earth can you keep a straight face to say U.S. is the leader of the free world. No one know!

In many cities in the U.S. one cannot go to certain parts of the inner city like the Queens in New York. As crimes are rampant. So normal innocent and good Americans like you have to avoid that part of America! Surely freedom means you can go to anywhere or any part of America.

Kids and parents suffers the mental turmoils daily for just going to school. Many got shot to death in schools, public places, cinemas and even in Capitol Hill! Is that freedom? Even your kids are not free to go to school without a random mass shooter lurking with military grade weapons to murder them! Is this freedom?

If you are not fortunate to have a white skin you could be necked to death in the bright daylight of even driving a good car may be be shot to death just for suspected of stealing the car! Everyday you live in fear of a white policeman! Is that freedom to live? Freedom to avoid death at the racist inclination of the white racist? Surely not.

Freedom means you can choose who you really want to be your leader. Only 30% choose Biden. Or 35% choose Trump! Why are they your president? Your system allowed 0.8% of the richest and most influential people to choose your candidates! Surely this is not political freedom. This is far from democracy. How on earth can you call yourself the “beacon of democracy” who in a sane mind can claim that?

Oh today you country stop the Americans from having access to best 5G technology, Smartphone, best EV’s, drones and others for some geopolitical nonsense! Is this freedom? Freedom to be deprived? Let me help you understand. You are deprived from buying a 10 bucks EV. And need to be charged once a week but you are not allowed to! You cannot buy your Tesla like for half the price! Just to support your too big to fail auto industry paying 100 million bonus doing shit for good Americans!

But to me EVs and Drones are just the top of the iceberg of your draconian and suicide policies that takes away the freedom of Americans like you. Think about Jullien Assange, Bradley Manning and Edward Snowden! Freedom? American is anything but free.

Man these people are monsters

What conversations have you overheard in a language they assumed you don’t know?

It was 2016 in Bruges, Belgium. I was with my parents and we had just hailed a cab that somehow turned into a ride-share with this British family.

All was well in the van until about three minutes in, when I heard the lady say: “These people look a bit funny, don’t they?”. I looked up to notice that they were talking about my family. In plain English.

I stayed silent as much as I could, as they went on discussing among themselves and chuckling over how we were so bundled up (It was in the middle of a freezing winter and I live in the freaking equator!) even though it wasn’t that cold for them, or how they couldn’t figure out where we’re from because apparently we didn’t look Chinese enough nor Middle Eastern enough for them (Answer: Neither – we’re Indonesian) and all. During the whole ride, they were mocking us.

My mother must’ve seen me giving them a death stare and asked if anything was wrong, in Indonesian. Topping it all off, they were of course chuckling at how my mom was talking really funny. I couldn’t stand it any more, so I answered my mom in English, making sure the British family heard me well:

“Yes there is a problem here. Some people actually still think that English isn’t a universal language by now, and think that it’s good fun to mock and make fun of other people just because of how they look”.

I spent the rest of the cab ride watching the blood drain from their faces. At least I was no longer the one being uncomfortable in that cab.

Lord, Jesus help us

What are some deepest lessons you should know in your young age?

1. Feeling sad after making a decision doesn’t mean it was the wrong decision.
2. Life is not tiring. Wanting life to be a certain way but not having the confidence to make it that way, is tiring.
3. Self-awareness is realising that there is no opponent -you’re fighting against yourself.
4. Sometimes saying ‘goodbye’ doesn’t mean you don’t love something, it just means you love yourself too.
5. That lesson will repeat itself until you learn it.
6. If you keep one hand on your past and one hand on your future you’ll never have either. To embrace tomorrow, you must let go of yesterday.
7. The world starts and ends entirely inside your mind. No matter where you end up, no matter how rich, or successful you become, you won’t enjoy any of it if you get there at the expense of your mental health.

Chinese ethnic groups

https://www.youtube.com/shorts/SC7IyLLt6PA?feature=share

What is the fastest you have ever seen your co-worker getting fired?

As a teenager, I worked in a gas station for a couple of years. A younger kid got hired who had some odd work habits. When the station owner would leave, the kid would just go sit down in the office. Meanwhile, I’d be pumping gas, changing oil, or mounting tires. I had no authority over this kid.

A few days after he was hired, I told the owner what was going on. An hour or two later the owner mentioned he was going home for an hour or two. He departed, the kid sat down in the office, while I finished doing an oil change and waited on customers at the pumps.

Ten minutes later, the boss walked out the alley where he’d parked his truck out of sight, and stood quietly in the shadows, watching me work, and the kid sitting on his butt. A few minutes later, the kid was fired. Word got around our small town pretty quickly, I don’t think this kid could find another job that summer.

I wasn’t sad to see him leave…

What is the most absurd thing you’ve been charged for on a bill?

Years ago I strained a tendon in my thumb. I went to one of those jenky quick service medical clinics to have it looked at and a person, who I assumed had some training in doctoring or nursing, prescribed me ibuprofen and put my hand in a brace.

I paid them like 50 bucks and went on my way.

A few weeks later I got a bill for the brace from a medical billing company in Texas. They assigned a cost of $750 to the brace, and only the brace, claimed to have billed my insurance for $450 and expect the rest from me. Of course, I sent them nothing, and the bills kept coming. The brace was essentially the same as one you’d buy at the drug store for about $35. It was nothing special and there was no way I was sending them any money. I tried to call them, but no one ever answered their phone.

Once my tendon healed, I put the brace in a box, along with a copy of their bill and mailed it to them. I never received anther bill afterwards.

Good advice

Why did China keep collapsing throughout history?

This is an interesting question.

Why did ancient China keep collapsing?

Or , let’s change the question.

Why did ancient China keep rebuilding?

In fact, there is no eternal empire in human history. From Mesopotamia, Ancient Egypt, Greece, Rome, China, Ottoman, Russia. The lifespan of any empire established by a civilization is limited. In other words, crashes are bound to happen.

But the difference between China and other empires is that most ancient empires collapse only once. Because the collapsed empire can never be rebuilt again. But China has such a magical power that no matter how it collapses, it will always be reunified after a period of time, and then climb to the peak again.

1. This picture shows the whole history of China. The crown represents peace and unity, and the sword represents division and war. 

So much so that the opening sentence of the famous ancient Chinese novel “The Romance of the Three Kingdoms” reads: “The general trend of the world is that if it is divided for a long time, it will be united, and if it is united for a long time, it will be divided.”

Why China has such magic power, historians have many opinions.

One of the more widely recognized statements is this:

4,000 years ago, the Chinese were born on a land suitable for farming. Since the earliest civilized countries were established, they have been a typical agricultural civilization.

From the earliest recorded history of China, they have faced the threat from the north. That is the nomadic civilization galloping on the grasslands. In the early historical documents of Chinese dynasties, the invasion of nomadic civilization was recorded many times, and even the most brilliant Western Zhou Dynasty perished because of the invasion of nomadic civilization.

The ancestors of the Chinese discovered that the agricultural civilization, which is good at farming and construction, cannot compete with the nomadic civilization, which is good at riding and archery, in war. (Infantry can hardly defeat cavalry).
But as long as they are united, they will become more powerful. If 1 person can’t defeat the enemy, then 3 people; if 3 people can’t, then 10 people. Since agricultural civilization can breed more wealth and population, once China is united, the nomads are no match at all.

In 221 BC, the Qin Empire unified China for the first time, defeated the Xiongnu in war, and built the Great Wall to keep them out of the cold north. The Han Empire went a step further and formed a professional army of hundreds of thousands of people, went on an expedition to the desert, and completely defeated the Xiongnu. A unified and strong state always protects its people from harm. And when the empire crumbles and divides, China becomes weak. For example, the Northern and Southern Dynasties and the Five Dynasties and Ten Kingdoms period were all like this. At this time, the enemy from the north invaded, the internal war was in chaos, and the society was dark. People cannot live a normal life, and starvation and death become the norm. Every round of imperial collapse and division in Chinese history will be accompanied by wars and a significant reduction in population. The lessons of history have engraved this truth deeply in the hearts of the Chinese people—unity is justice and light, and division is evil and darkness. The Chinese yearning for unity transcends history, time, religion, and nationality.

Therefore, the ultimate political goal of every careerist who wished to seize power in ancient China was the same: to unify the country and obtain the “sky destiny”. Only in this way can we gain the support of the people.

Imagine if in Europe, every German thought the German government was evil, the British thought the British government was dark, and the French thought the French government was corrupt. These governments should all be overthrown. As for the reason, there is only one: they don’t want to unify Europe, which is not the right direction.

What a terrible and incredible power this is, but the Chinese have such power.

A beautiful lesson

AH. I want to do this with my daughter.

What are some of the best examples of “American ignorance”?

I used to date an American. At the time I lived on an estate where to get out, you had to drive under a railway bridge arch. He got annoyed with having to wait for oncoming traffic to clear and demanded to know “why the hell didn’t they build this with two lanes?” I said it was built 150 years ago for stagecoaches, before cars were even invented. Americans forget how old England is.

What are some things that look easy but are difficult?

I asked a cycle rickshaw driver in India if I could have a turn. “This’ll be as easy as riding a bicycle,” I thought.

Technically, that’s exactly what it is. Only that you’re pulling someone else’s weight as well. Or even that of several people.

His face had all those deep grooves from the harsh sun beating down on him all day. His arms and legs were as thin as twigs. His ribcage bulged through a sweat-drenched tanktop.

I was less than half his age and enjoyed the kind of nutrition he could only dream of.

“You’re a tourist,” he protested.

But I insisted and he sat on the vinyl seat in the back.

I mounted the driver’s seat brimming with confidence and pressed down on the pedal.

It didn’t even budge.

I stood up and pushed down with all my might.

The rickshaw squeaked forward a couple inches.

By this point, the driver was laughing hysterically.

I conceded defeat, we changed positions, and he sailed down the street with an ease I could not even begin to fathom.

And while he was no industry-disrupting maverick, he was solving a real problem—helping people get from A to B.

My view of manual laborers was forever changed.

I learned that technique always trumps strength.

And that every honest line of work deserves our utmost respect.

Neil deGrasse Tyson: America is declining RAPIDLY

https://youtu.be/0gjzpZMFVsE