This week's Odd Prompts writing challenge at More Odds than Ends is from Becky Jones: Dark, ominous clouds piled up on the horizon.The obvious was an incoming storm -- but what kind of storm. That led me to think of the possibility of an incoming haboob (dust storm) somewhere in the Middle East, perhaps during the Energy Wars. A little fiddling ( Read more... )

... or why Agatha Christie could afford to hire two servants, but not buy a car.

It boils down to an economic principle first elucidated by William Baumol. Although not all jobs enjoy the same increases in productivity from automation, the wages of the jobs that aren't so affected are pulled up by the increase in productivity of the jobs that are ( Read more... )

There's a new vignette challenge over at Sarah Hoyt's blog. My effort is from the Grissom timeline, as an astronaut on the Moon considers the weirdness of lunar sunrise and sunset.

marycatelli has a new vignette challenge on her Dreamwidth blog. My effort is also from the Grissom timeline, but deals with the complexity of the tourist trade in Grissom City ( Read more... )

I am not a morning person, so I always look forward to the Fall time change and dread the Spring one ( Read more... )

Is it my imagination, or are people becoming worse drivers? I don't think it's just watching lots of Reels of dashcam video of people doing stupid things and causing wrecks, because I've been cut off and passed on the right multiple times, often right at the corner south of our house ( Read more... )

IV fluid is something we tend to take for granted. After a family member was in the hospital twice this year, I became very familiar with the sight of a bag of IV fluid on its stand at the bedside -- and learned how to communicate to the nurses' station so they'd understand when the line was clogged again ( Read more... )

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Elon Musk's ultimate goal is establishing permanent colonies on Mars and making humanity a multi-planet species so no disaster on Earth could be our extinction. However, there are many intermediate steps on that journey.

In the wake of the triumphal recapture of the Starship booster, Eric Berger has an analysis of the next steps they'll need to ( Read more... )

This week's Odd Prompts writing challenge at More Odds than Ends is from AC Young: He was convinced that he’d cracked the code on the treasure map.It sounded very much like a story of a pirate treasure -- but in what circumstances? It felt like a fantasy, and after some reflection, I thought maybe it could be a dark fantasy, like the one glimpsed ( Read more... )

I'm astonished by the early-voting turnouts here in Marion County. Back in 2020, we went to vote on the first Saturday that the satellite sites opened (before that, the City-County Building downtown is the only option for early voting), and the line wrapped around the township building, stretched out to the street, then doubled back. We were able ( Read more... )