1.) The reason butterflies fly like they are drunk, bouncing all over the place, is an evolutionary adaptation that helps to make their flight path difficult to predict, thwarting potential predators. The more poisonous ones don’t do this as much because fuck you go ahead and eat me you prick.
2.) Bobsled dogs poop while running. Which means it really pays to be the lead dog.
They are very talented, they run and poop at the same time
— Blair Braverman (@BlairBraverman) June 14, 2019
3.) I actually really enjoy the process of sanding and staining wood. I’m putting a book case in my office and the cheapest option was to just make it myself. It’s been fun.
4.) I should have purchased a pickup truck instead of the CRV. Not on of those giant vehicle penises, but just something to haul shit in.
*** UPDATE ***
Will all the front pagers PLEASE EMAIL ME AT JGRIFFINCOLE @ GMAIL . COM
I purchased the email server and need all your current emails so I can set you up with a zoho account for website use.
Jerzy Russian
I can haul several 8 foot 2 by 6 boards in my CRV. Large sheets of plywood, not so much.
Speaking of pooping, when do they poop (or sleep) in movies? For example, in the Bourne Identity, our heroes are going all over Europe, apparently without bathroom breaks. Likewise in that Mission Impossible movie where they diffuse that nuclear bomb in Tibet, our heroes seemed to be at it for a few days straight, with little to no down time to see to personal business.
A Ghost To Most
Making/repairing things is incredible therapy. Given the number of projects and art I’ve completed in the last year, I must have been audibly ticking.
Embrace the suck of home ownership.
Gin & Tonic
Bobsleds don’t have dogs. Dogsleds do.
Dorothy A. Winsor
@Jerzy Russian: I always wonder that when people are being held captive. It’s one of the things you don’t put in books either.
chopper
@Jerzy Russian:
i was wondering about john wick. when the fuck does he eat? take a crap?
chopper
@chopper:
maybe he’s like a sled dog and he takes a dump while he’s breaking some sucker’s neck with a library book. that’s talent.
Jerzy Russian
@Dorothy A. Winsor:
I remember “personal business” was mentioned in one of Gary Paulson’s books. The main characters were taken captive and were riding on horses for long hours. Can’t recall the title at the moment, but I could probably pick that book out if it was placed on a table among his other books.
kindness
I have a truck for my 2nd car. You could too John. Yea it’s more expensive paying for 2 cars but having a truck frees me when I need to haul stuff or take my dogs out to the river or up the mountain for fun. The 4 wheel drive is required for the spring mud and the winter snow up in the hills. And really the mileage isn’t that much different from the 6 cylinder Tacoma we used to use to the F-150 we do now. Ended up choosing the 5 liter v8 because the 6 is a weak dog and the 5.7 is a gas hog and I don’t have boats or trailers to haul. Didn’t need it.
rikyrah
Oh Cole
BWA HA HA HA HA HA HA HAA
ant
pick ups are expensive to buy, and to fuel.
Also, I have found the winter traction to be disappointing. My silverado slides all over the place in the snow, with the handling characteristics of a 1974 Cadillac fleetwood.
We bought a second set of rims and blizzak tires for our CRV, and the soft grippy rubber in the winter VERY noticeable.
dmsilev
@Gin & Tonic: Now I’m envisioning a dogbobsled run. Starts out at the top of the track with 8 huskies pulling the sled, then after a few seconds all of the dogs pile into the sled and the one human at the back has to steer it down the course. With, naturally, the dogs sticking their heads out into the breeze as it picks up speed.
Who do we have to bribe at the IOC to make this a thing?
rikyrah
In m-o-d-e-r-a-t-i-o-n, please help
Jerzy Russian
@chopper: I don’t think I have ever seen those movies. I watch movies almost exclusively on airplanes, and I haven’t travelled much lately. I assume his day is filled almost entirely of action scenes?
currants
re: CRV, have been thinking about that problem. {ETA: Anyone with better solutions–opinions welcome!}
I have an Element, which is pretty gardener/handy-person friendly, but not great gas mileage, doesn’t carry what my truck could, and also can’t take all three of my grandchildren at one time. (And won’t for several years since the oldest is just 6.) I was leaning toward a CRV, but it does not appear to be as gardener/handy-friendly. Everyone laughs at me that one of the things I love about my car is I can hose it out (like a truck), but…that’s a real advantage. (Means I can put a tarp in and haul compost I shovel from the town at $2/barrel.)
So far I’m staying with the Element and taking my daughter’s car when she turns over all three kids at the same time. It’s working for now.
kindness
@ant: We went to Costco and got the best All Terrain tires they sell for our model truck. It made a huge difference on the ride and the grip to the surface your driving. The ride is significantly better than the radials that came with the truck. It was a great move.
currants
@ant:
Great line, and great description of bigger pickup handling. Mine were both Tacomas, and a couple of sand bags or cement blocks in the back helped in the winter. The first one (a ’94) got pretty decent mileage too, though the second one (’05) wasn’t great, was much bigger/harder to park, and I didn’t keep it.
OzarkHillbilly
When you get done with your’s John, I’ve got a few projects you can help me with.
Betty Cracker
My mom went dogsledding in Minnesota many years ago, and that was the first thing she told people about the experience when she got home — the dogs poop while running!
I once rode a mule down into the Grand Canyon with a bunch of people (guided tour thing), and the mules DID NOT poop and pee on the go. Our progress was slow because every time one of the dozen or so mules had to wee or poop, it stopped, and everyone behind had to wait until it finished before proceeding since we were on a narrow trail traveling single file.
Two takeaways from that experience: mules STINK, and looking over a pair of mule ears down into a 900-foot chasm is scary and makes one fret about the mule’s mental health.
OzarkHillbilly
@ant: They are light in the ass end.
Dorothy A. Winsor
@Jerzy Russian: Tolkien is very uptight, but when Fellowship is traveling, someone is always wandering off to the edge of the clearing. I figure that’s a euphemism.
MomSense
@chopper:
I always get grossed out when the leading couple kisses after days of whatever action they are doing. Pretty sure after fighting and spitting blood and spending days evading or chasing or whatever they have terrible breath. They don’t appear to be brushing their teeth ever.
Dorothy A. Winsor
@MomSense: They kiss first thing in the morning too, without brushing their teeth. Or peeing for that matter.
Jerzy Russian
@Betty Cracker: My Dad told horror stories of hiking down some of those trails in the early 1970s. Apparently hikers had to stand on the edge of the trail to let the mules pass, apparently because the mules would not walk near the edge. I would hope that these days the mules and hikers use separate trails, given the huge increase in park attendance since then.
Gin & Tonic
@OzarkHillbilly:
I find that relaxing, too, although I’m not going to come out to Misery to do it.
After a couple of years of neglect, I’m re-applying varnish to my kayak, which does involve a lot of sanding. Other than the fact that the damn varnish is 60 bucks a quart, it’s nice to watch the finish build up.
OzarkHillbilly
@Gin & Tonic: I’ll throw in free beer, meals, and a nice sleeping bag and a tent.
chris
Lots of folks around here with small SUVs and modest aluminum trailers. A friend says the trailer will haul about the same as his ford ranger and he doesn’t have the horrible gas mileage all the time.
Jerzy Russian
@MomSense:
Or flossing…
Jerzy Russian
Also too, remember that giant space snake in the Empire Strikes Back ? Those turds must be huge.
Barbara
@chris: Yes, this was going to be my recommendation. For light hauling, a small trailer works well — I wouldn’t do it over a long distance. For the occasional heavy duty job, you can rent a U-Haul.
Re: Butterfly flight — I have read materials on self-defense that recommend running on a zig zag and unpredictable course if you are trying to run away from someone holding a gun. Same idea.
Quicksand
@chris:
This is the correct answer. At TSC (there’s one in Wheeling) you can get a 5×8 open trailer for under $1,000 (not aluminum, but cheap). You’ll need a hitch too, of course. That will haul plenty of home-improvement stuff, and when you’re done, you can put it away on the side of the house or wherever.
CaseyL
@Barbara:
But my impression is that the average random shooter is horribly inaccurate. So I wonder if running zigzag would actually increase your chances of being shot.
Josie
@MomSense:
My middle son never hesitates to remind us when we are watching a movie that is historical in nature that the people are probably dirty and smell really bad. It tends to take the romance out of things.
Leto
@chopper: @Jerzy Russian: The John Wick movies take place over about five days. The last movie explained that. Wick has traveled over the Atlantic twice so I figure he slept then. Probably ate two meals each time. At the end of the last one, he’s probably going to get a few days of rest. This is just being pedant, but absolutely cede the larger point made. I’ve wondered the same thing.
John: if you’re buying your lumber from a big box store, they usually have a truck you can rent. Costs $20 an hour. I’ve used one several times to ferry supplies back home. Just a thought.
Barbara
@Josie: If you believe emerging scientific literature, people don’t necessarily smell “bad” in a state of nature, because their skin tends to foster microbes and bacteria that eat things like sweat. So, as easy as it is to think this way, the evidence is pretty clear that passion and romance have existed forever. People were not turned off by each other’s body odor the way we are now.
Dorothy A. Winsor
@Josie: I once read this living history experiment in which a woman lived in a medieval hut. As I recall this was all filmed for the BBC. She washed her clothes and rubbed herself down with a rough cloth daily, while someone in the camera crew showered etc but didn’t wash their clothes. Everyone agreed the hut woman didn’t smell much but the dirty clothes woman did. I thought that was interesting.
Of course, people often had only one set of clothes. Spinning, weaving, and sewing rendered clothes one of the most expensive things people owned.
zhena gogolia
@Dorothy A. Winsor:
One of the greatest things in Crime and Punishment is how Dostoevsky shows the poor woman staying up all night to launder her family’s clothes, because of course they only have one of everything.
BruceJ
Not a pickup. Go buy one of those $450 Harbor Freight utility trailers and get a hitch on the CRV, MUCH cheaper than a pickup.
MattF
The sled dog factoid reminds me of the old LBJ line, reported as ‘can’t walk and chew gum at the same time’. He actually said ‘can’t walk and fart at the same time’.
Gin & Tonic
@Barbara: One of the plot elements in the cheesy old “historical novel” Shogun, if I recall correctly, was the Japanese revulsion at the body odor of the meat-eating Englishmen.
chris
“Wash your hands often, your feet seldom and your head, never.”
English proverb from the 18th century. It’s been stuck in my head since I read a history of the bath many years ago. Ew.
noncarborundum
@Jerzy Russian: *defuse
/spelling pet peeve – sorry
MattF
@Gin & Tonic: Also a plot element in the SFF novel ‘The Long Way to a Small, Angry Planet’, where humans are notorious in a multi-species inhabited galaxy for being stinky and having a poor sense of smell.
schrodingers_cat
@Gin & Tonic: Many brahmins had elaborate rituals to preserve purity which involved elebenty baths. Sitting dripping wet for a puja and many such ridiculous things. The entire caste system revolves around these notions of purity.
CaseyL
Under the topic “Making a Virtue of Necessity,” the odors we find offensive today were apparently exciting to our forebears. While on campaign, Napoleon is supposed to have written to his wife “I return home in a month. Do not bathe.”
jimmiraybob
Is “run and poop” some kind of metaphor for impeachment?
Roger Moore
@Jerzy Russian:
Where do you think the meteor belt comes from?
Charluckles
Do you have a truck rental joint close by? Ours has a pick-up truck. One of the best things is that I don’t have to worry when the highschool kid running the loader drops a ton of 3/4 inch rock in the bed.
AnderJ
It is the weiderst sight. The dog kind of let itself be dragged by the other dogs giving it the opportunity to squat down. No poop is flung even while running.
J R in WV
@CaseyL:
How would you tell whether you have a typical schmoe shooting at you, or a former Marine pistol champion? I have shot in the lane next to a former Marine pistol champion, he did not lose any mad skills when he left the Marines to run the shooting range near Camp LeJeune !!
ALSO: Reading Google News headlines… All the Technology section headlines are about Games.
Games are NOT technology, they are Entertainment. Technology is new storage technology, new memory tech, new CPU designs, Quantum computing, etc, if we’re talking computing tech, but tech is also rocket tech, bandwidth tech, genetic modeling tech, etc.
BUT NOT GAMES!!!
This sort of assignment of data type reflects the lack of wisdom and broad experience among Google’s staff, which appears to be mostly — wait for it — GAMERS! So sad!!
——————————————————————-
I also find building things, or working in the woods or “yard” to be relaxing. Today is going to be sunny and beautiful and cool, so chainsawing
The Dangerman
Balloon Juice. Come for the pet/duck pictures, stay for the discussion of dogs shitting.
Or the Willow, I suppose. Can’t forget the Willow.
chopper
@currants:
my element carries everything. it’s a goddamn tardis, that car.
joel hanes
@currants:
Anyone with better solutions–opinions welcome!
Buy the best Yakima or Thule crossbar rack you can get for your vehicle.
Get a 4×8 sheet of half-inch plywood, and affix it to the rack.
Now you have a platform on which you can carry queen mattresses, lumber, foosball tables, cinder block, what have you.
When you’re done, the racks pop off.
I had a little Saturn wagon for a dozen years, and could move pretty much anything I needed using this approach.
jeffreyw
@Barbara:
Serpentine!
@CaseyL:
Actually the opposite is true – it is known that running a zig zag in the rain will keep you from getting wet.
RepubAnon
@Gin & Tonic: I suggest reading “Winterdance: The Fine Madness of Running the Iditarod” – if you need to laugh yourself silly, read this book’s “skunk chapter.”
chopper
@Barbara:
right. when i need to haul a bunch of drywall or full sheets of ply/osb, i just rent a truck for a few hours. everything smaller fits in the Element. just brought a load of plywood for the floor in my bathroom remodel home in it, cut down to 4’X7′, fit right in with the seats up.
Dog Mom
Beagles have that talent too. Nose on a scent “Drop-along Dottie” doesn’t miss a step .
Leto
@J R in WV: Glad there’s no room for software tech. The clouds are that way, grandpa.
gvg
I have a Mazda 5 which is the smallest minivan. back 2 rows of seats fold flat and I can load some fairly large things in it, then turn it back into a car. Eventually I had to take some smelly things to the dump and wanted to bring home some messy things, as I garden. I bought this to go inside
It is a protective liner to inside your SUV or van. Think of it like a giant PVC vinyl sack that lies on its side with the open end at the hatch. the “bottom” and sides are clear so you can see through the windows, however most of the time, whatever needed to be carried was big enough that I couldn’t use the windows. The bottom has a longer flap that can hang off the end to protect the back bumper. Mine is a pretty thick tough plastic, that I probably couldn’t cut with a knife. I am not sure this is the same brand though. there are velcro straps at the front interior end and the back end. You stick them out the windows and over the top of the car to latch together and hold the upper part up to the roof so you can fill the bag. I have used it to get smelly trash to the dump and bring home a pallet of sod for example. then remove the bag, shake it out if just dirt, or hose off, dry and fold till needed again. The rest of the time I have a car.
I just found this on ebay by searching for suv protective liner hauling, but there are probably better searches. I know I did get it off ebay brand new several years ago. I don’t remember how I found out these exist.
Matt McIrvin
I recall hearing some stuff about ancient Roman bathing– what they didn’t have was soap, but instead (if I recall correctly) they’d get out of the bath, rub themselves down with scented oils, and scrape off the excess with this sort of dull blade called a stridulum. Probably kept them smelling OK, at least if they could afford it.
Gin & Tonic
@The Dangerman:
There was a front-page picture of Walter’s shit, IIRC. So it’s not just discussion, it’s photos.
Another Scott
@Dog Mom: My step-mom’s sheltie does that too – doesn’t bother to stop while she’s pooping. Strange little doggie…
Cheers,
Scott.
Kelly
@BruceJ: I had folding trailer similar to the Harbor Freight trailer. Very useful hauling messy loads like mulch or trash, bulky loads like building supplies, easy to push around by hand when empty and stores in a small space. The 1000 lbs capacity was almost always adequate. I hauled camping gear at highway speeds every summer. Those little bitty wheels were fine.
About 20 years ago I bought a house with a wood stove so I bought a welded steel 4,000 lbs trailer that could haul a cord of wood. It needs it own parking space but it is so much more useful than a pickup. The deck is low and unobstructed. Best of all I don’t worry about denting it.
Robert Harvey
@dmsilev:
I have an even better idea. Combine biathlon (skiing and shooting) with ski jumping and skeet shooting. Each side takes turns shooting at the other side’s ski jumpers. Paint balls, presumably.
J R in WV
@Leto:
Why, you little whippersnapper, I’ll have you know that I can whap you with this giant onion I have right here on my belt!!
Oh, wait, I’m not wearing pants yet this morning, the onion is on the belt in the bedroom.
Never mind!!1011
;-)
Still, games are not tech news, that’s entertainment news! Tech is new rocket-ships, or giant beam weapons, or CERN particle accelerators, and such…
burnspbesq
Living in Austin has only reinforced my hatred for big trucks and SUVs. My next car (or my current car if I exercise the purchase option) is going to have a REALLY LOUD backup warning, since nobody can see me when I’m parked between two crimes against the environment.
Barbara
@gvg: We have a thick vinyl liner for our Volvo station wagon, from the early 90s, which is what we use to haul stuff, with the seats down. The back of the hatch is pristine when we remove the liner.
MomSense
@Another Scott:
My dog does a poop dance. She spins and stops and starts to squat then all of sudden moves a bit and spins some more before settling on a location. When she finally starts her face looks so pathetic. Ears down and back with a baleful expression.
Hey, John Cole, what about a small trailer. If you do t have a hitch on your CRV you could probably add one. They come in handy for all sort stuff of things from lawn mowers or tractors, large dump runs, or garden supplies, lumber, etc.
Searcher
@ant: I got an interesting lesson in static friction versus kinetic friction in my truck in the winter.
Pull up to a stop sign on a steep hill with a bit of snow on the ground. Go to pull out, rear wheels spin, nothing happens.
Shift into 4 wheel drive, try again … all wheels spin, truck slides backwards.
Searcher
You know the other great thing about a small trailer over a pickup truck?
You don’t have to lift all your shit three feet in the air to load it in the truck, then climb up into the back of the truck to drag it to the front of the bed to make room for more stuff, then climb in and out of the bed of the truck twenty times while unloading it when you get home.
Dr Ronnie James DO
@chopper: I had an Element and loved it. Great city car for a family in the NE: easy to park, great in the snow, easy to keep clean (you can hose the interior!), and when you fold the seats out of the way or take them out. And amazing legroom – I could fit my 3 small kids in the back WITH NO SEAT KICKING.
But the gas mileage is atrocious, it also has terrible range bc the gas tank is teeny tiny (12 gal? 14?) and it drives like a UPS van (and kinda looks like one, too).
A Ghost To Most
Agree about the trailer. I bought a heavy duty flatbed to carry my soon to be built roll-on/roll-off sleeping cabin, and it has repeatedly proven useful in hauling shit around.
frosty
@jeffreyw: I was waiting to see if somebody linked “Serpentine!!” I have to watch that movie again.
Fair Economist
GRRM got a lot of flack in the GoT books because he *did* write about characters attending to personal business.
PST
@MomSense: We have a poop dancer too. More of a poop pacer, actually. Back and forth, back and forth, faster and faster until ready. It’s really quite convenient. Once it starts you know you can be heading home in two minutes.
Leto
@J R in WV:
Late response but let’s brake this down:
New rocket ships is luxury travel, not tech news. CERN particle accelerator is underground tunneling projects aka infrastructure, not tech news. I can keep going on with this but honestly it’s embarrassing that you keep spouting that gaming is not tech news considering that the software and hardware drive each other. Like I get it that you don’t like gaming, or have an 80s understanding of this, but the technology involved with gaming isn’t just on the hardware side.
But I can’t wait to hear your next “ITS NOT TECH” line will be.
Vhh
@joel hanes: concrete blocks?