[subego]

Originally Posted by Thorzdad 

TIL there is a World Chase Tag championship…

I’m listening.

Originally Posted by Thorzdad 

…on a closed indoor course.

God dammit. That’s just tag. World Chase tag is when you’re “it” in Sioux Falls and the next closest player is in Karachi

[Thorzdad]

The course is a lot like an explosion in a jungle gym factory. Multi levels, platforms, rails, etc. It’s a set of one-on-one chases through the course. It’s pretty fun.

[subego]

Not as fun as watching someone parkour the Bering Strait.

[Thorzdad]

[subego]

Filipino garlic rice.

[ghporter]

Actually “Filipino [just about anything].” And often these exceed the “minor” range of pleasure.

One benefit of being an Air Force guy was that I knew a LOT of people who were from PI. Some GIs were originally Filipino, and some “white bread American” GIs married Filipinas. And let me tell you, pot luck meals were always a treat.

Later, one of my closest coworkers was a Filipina therapist. And yeah, any time we did a pot luck, she came through.

Now I need pancit and lumpia.

[subego]

Took delivery of a used Mac Mini today.

The previous owner had saved and reapplied the black tape protecting the connectors. Whole thing had the translucent plastic wrapping, too.

[subego]

Originally Posted by ghporter 

Actually “Filipino [just about anything].” And often these exceed the “minor” range of pleasure.

One benefit of being an Air Force guy was that I knew a LOT of people who were from PI. Some GIs were originally Filipino, and some “white bread American” GIs married Filipinas. And let me tell you, pot luck meals were always a treat.

Later, one of my closest coworkers was a Filipina therapist. And yeah, any time we did a pot luck, she came through.

Now I need pancit and lumpia.

The place I found with the rice has “longanisa”, which are these great little sausages, and “tocino”, which is some of the best pork shoulder I’ve ever had.

[subego]

Parking in a metered spot without paying and not getting a ticket

This is our legalized gambling.

[ghporter]

Kinda like rolling the dice to see if the meter gets checked?

In San Antonio, all city parking is free for anyone with a Disabled Veteran plate. At least a Texas DV plate; I don’t know how they handle out of state DVs. I qualify for that, so parking meters are free, city parking garages are free, and even airport parking is free. That by itself - no issues with “how much is airport parking going to cost?” - is a very nice minor pleasure.

[subego]

Originally Posted by ghporter 

Kinda like rolling the dice to see if the meter gets checked?

Exactly!

In Chicago, the only way to get a disability exemption is being too disabled to work the meter.

[Laminar]

Originally Posted by subego 

Parking in a metered spot without paying and not getting a ticket

This is our legalized gambling.

The upside to downside ratio seems a bit off - at best you save...a buck twenty five? What's a ticket? $15?

[Thorzdad]

Originally Posted by Laminar 

The upside to downside ratio seems a bit off - at best you save...a buck twenty five? What's a ticket? $15?

I don’t think parking tickets have been that cheap in eons.

[Laminar]

The last time I got one was in college, it was like $8. I fought them every time.

[ghporter]

I got a ticket for an expired meter in New Orleans (a LONG time ago). As far as I could tell, the meter shouldn’t have been expired when the ticket was written, so I fought it. By mail, since I was on active duty in Biloxi and couldn’t get away.

And I won. They took that meter out of service and tested it. It was faulty, and they dismissed the ticket.

I also got a ticket for “rolling a stop sign” on Thanksgiving Day right in front of a cop car I could see - I even made eye contact. Kind of hard to respect a stop sign when there’s a FREAKING TREE growing over it. I took pictures, and showed them to the city judge…he dismissed the ticket.

Winning was great, but the stress of having to actually go to that city court and present my case was really harsh.

[ShortcutToMoncton]

Yeah I just pay tickets unless they’re points-related (haven’t had one of those in a long time knock on wood). A $45 parking ticket or $65 camera ticket is really not worth the effort. Accept you got caught and move on!

[subego]

I actually got busted once not coming to a complete and total stop, and contested even though I was 100% guilty. I won because the cop was a no-show.

The judge also gave me the evil eye for correcting her on how to pronounce my name, but fuck her if she’s got a problem with basic respect.


Edit: forgot to add, it did fix the problem. I don’t do rolling stops anymore.

[subego]

Originally Posted by Laminar 

The upside to downside ratio seems a bit off - at best you save...a buck twenty five? What's a ticket? $15?

$75 for the ticket. $2.50-$7.50 per hour for parking, but you don’t need to take a full hour.

Admittedly, the gambling analogy works better parking in a tow zone, but with meter parking there is the added upside of cheating revenue out of the company who’s leased the city’s parking rights.

I know it’s petty. Not just in dollar amount, but what I’m angry about is the city taking their lousy offer and wasting all the money. It’s not the company’s fault the city did that.

[Laminar]

Originally Posted by subego 

$75 for the ticket.

Yikes! Apparently I had an inverse Lucille Bluth moment.

[andi*pandi]

The last parking ticket I got was $30. Cutthroat policies in Old Orchard Beach fenced off the path from the beach to the parking lot so it's a hella walk and we were 5 min late to feed the meter. They did not backdown in the face of my outraged flatlander "do you want me to spend $150 on rides and ice cream or your parking ticket" letter.

[subego]

Our parking system actually has an app. You can “feed the meter” from the app. No walk necessary.

Awesome, right?

Yeah, except for the fine print where you get charged a “convenience fee” of 35¢ if it’s less than two hours. You’ve got to pre-load your account with money to use it too.

It’s shit like this which makes me feel more justified trying to cheat them.

[ShortcutToMoncton]

Toronto has an app. Super easy to use and you can load it easily. Pretty great.

[subego]

I’d be fine with it, even complimentary, if it wasn’t for the convenience charge. That’s just predatory bullshit.

[ShortcutToMoncton]

I’m not saying I agree with it but it’s 35 cents per short-term park. That’s probably less than $20 a year for most people. Not worth a thought.

[ghporter]

We’re visiting Galveston, Texas. And we really, REALLY wanted good (not at all good for you) burgers. This is on the top end of the “minor” pleasure spectrum: “The Spot” on Seawall Blvd. makes great - and huge - burgers. They definitely hit the spot. And then some, because we couldn’t really finish them.

[subego]

I’ve recently found a place (Burger Bar Chicago) that not only has an outstanding burger, but outstanding Parmesan-truffle fries and outstanding Oreo shakes.

Unfortunately, I can finish that, so I’ve also found they have outstanding smoked pork tacos.

[andi*pandi]

Originally Posted by ghporter 

We’re visiting Galveston, Texas. And we really, REALLY wanted good (not at all good for you) burgers. This is on the top end of the “minor” pleasure spectrum: “The Spot” on Seawall Blvd. makes great - and huge - burgers. They definitely hit the spot. And then some, because we couldn’t really finish them.

I have been there it really is the Spot! Excellent views of the water if I recall.

There was a great seafood place nearby in San Leon but I think it's gone now...

[subego]

Only 1 out of 10 Susan B’s in today’s rolls of dollar coins.

Nothing against Susan personally, but they’re too easy to confuse for a quarter.

[ghporter]

Back before it was made against the rules, we’d tip at renaissance festivals with dollar coins. No, tipping isn’t against the rules, but the “traditional” method of tipping the “bar wench” was. I leave the reader to consider how the cast and vendors at a ren faire dress to figure out what method was banned.

Anyway, we were happy when the gold-colored dollar coins came out for the very reason subego mentions - tipping someone with three “looks like a quarter” coins gets a different response from using three gold-colored coins.

[subego]

Ironically, I’ve run into the problem where people would superficially prefer a quarter because they don’t have the slightest idea dollar coins exist. They think I’m giving them arcade slugs.

The teller at the bank asked “do you actually use these or just collect them?” She had even forgotten how many were in a roll (25 for the curious).

[ghporter]

And yet there are many vending machines that won’t take my one dollar bill (because the bill acceptor is borked or “other”), but still take (gold) dollar coins.

Reminding the public that we have a cool coin that is almost as cool looking as a Loonie would be very helpful in a lot of ways. I don’t advocate doing away with the $1 bill, but if there’s one coin that I would like to see/have/use a lot more, it’s our $1 coin.

This reminds me of a (possibly at least partially apocryphal) story: when the local community around Air Base X had an upsurge in bad behavior toward Airmen (financial cheating, violence, etc.) per the base commander, everyone was paid in cash with $2 bills. Local market becomes flooded with $2 bills, city leaders suddenly realize that ANY community around a military installation is financially dependent on the GIs, and pressure on local bad actors “fixes” the issue. As in “Holy carp! More than 75% of our economy is based on those GIs spending money off base! We gotta fix this or we’re screwed!”

Like I said, probably apocryphal, but I saw the concept in action after Hurricane Frederick in 1979…

[subego]

Originally Posted by ghporter 

Holy carp!

[Brien]

I recall there being a push for $1 coins in the 2000’s, seems to have fizzled out.

[andi*pandi]

now that people can venmo or apple pay for small items yeah. I use coins a lot less.

[subego]

I mainly use them for tips where there’s no electronic option. Starbucks, coat check, etc.

[subego]

A dire emergency forced me to try Kroger pork rinds.

Not bad.

[Laminar]

Doing another Whole 30, so snacks lately have been pickles, olives, sweet potato chips, and various meat sticks (which are kind of cheating since they typically have nitrates).

These Trader Joe's Sweet Potato Crackers are insane. I could eat a whole box in one sitting.

https://www.amazon.com/Trader-Gluten.../dp/B078SPT9K8

[subego]

I’m doing low carb, and have been going to town on snack nori. I try to limit myself to one package, but usually put down three.

In the meat stick department, I mentioned the Holy Cow, which is fantastic. Also, Creminelli makes an out-of-this-world wild boar salami.

[subego]

Oh… both are nitrate free!

[subego]

More excellent salami.



Not the hugest fan of chorizo. It’s usually too spicy. This is perfect. They have a hot version if you’re into that.


Edit: it doesn’t explicitly say “nitrate free”, but everything points in that direction.

[ghporter]

A decent burger for lunch, right after donating blood. It doesn’t have to be a “great” burger, but that would be great. Today. Just after noon, Whataburger with cheese. Yum.

[Face Ache]

Running the shower on the back of your neck is as close as you can get to plugging into the Matrix without the use of illegal drugs.

[Thorzdad]

We went to the county 4H fair last Saturday, because our granddaughter wanted to see all the animals. I hadn’t been to a fair of any sort in a long time, so, hey, why not?

It was fun watching the granddaughter oooo and ahhhh over the animals. There were various large barns dedicated to individual types of animals. There was the Horse Barn, the Pig Barn, the Cattle Barn, the Sheep Barn, the Llama Barn...wait...the Llama Barn???

Yes, there was an entire barn devoted to 4H kids raising llamas, and it was...wonderful...if not just a wee bit other-worldly. All these farm kids, grooming and prepping llamas for the show, just like you’d see them grooming horses or goats. But, holy cow, I had no idea the variety of llamas. They were all gorgeous animals, but some of them truly looked like they were from another planet. Just beautiful animals.

[subego]

I’m surprised it wasn’t alpacas.

[Thorzdad]

We’re just simple hoosier folk down here, not some highfallutin’ Chicago lah-de-dahs.

[Thorzdad]

I’m just throwing this in here because it doesn’t really fit anywhere else, and it does tickle my little used-to-be-a-marketing-bot brain.

I think it’s bloody brilliant for Pedialyte to recast itself as a sport hydration/electrolyte drink, aimed at 20-30-something adults, who grew up drinking it as a little kid. They didn’t even bother to change the name, which I think is the smart move.

I saw a commercial a couple years ago when they started the shift. A dad comes in from doing something really exhausting (running, racquetball, I dunno) and is looking for something to drink. He sees a bottle of Pedialyte in the fridge, shrugs, grabs it, sits on the floor and starts chugging the stuff. Then, his little daughter (representing the age group the drink has traditionally been aimed at) comes into the kitchen, sees dad chugging the Pedialyte, and says “Hey, that’s mine!” The dad glances at her, then at the bottle, and replies “I’ll buy you a pony” and keeps drinking.

When I saw that commercial, I thought it was really well done as a subtle “we’re crossing the brand over, and following you kids” message.

The new commercials are more traditional “active young people sweating their butts off doing sporty stuff.”

[ghporter]

For a while, I’d slam some Pedialite after particularly heavy duty shifts at the hospital. Not from marketing, but from “Hey Glenn, you look gassed - try some Pedialite and you’ll feel better.” And they were right. However, I later I learned how to pace my hydration at work and avoid getting myself so dehydrated.

And on a related note, a not so minor pleasure is finally getting that shower you earned by doing moderately hard work for several hours in the heat. Yeah, that shower was awesome today.

[andi*pandi]

This week:
90º day = evening shower
95º day = run the yard sprinkler and intentionally get soaked
100º day = cold bath

[Thorzdad]

This qualifies as a Minor Pleasure because it made me giggle...

Old Win XP-era drives can crash when exposed to Janet Jackson’s Rhythm Nation.

[Laminar]

If any of you ever drive by a Casey's in the morning, grab a slice of breakfast pizza. I'm home with my son for the few days before school starts and we always grab a slice after dropping off his sister at her day care. I don't know what it is, but it's fantastic.