Rov_Scam
20d ago
If you're on a private tracker it's a different story. I haven't been on a private tracker since the days of what.cd, and I haven't felt the need to get on one since you can find pretty much anything on Soulseek or rutracker (though if you've got an invite I won't turn it down). As for your system, that's enough for it to be worth the difference in quality. Generally, if you have a "real stereo" that has a separate receiver and speakers you're there. If you've done any research into your purchases then you're probably chasing rainbows if you spend more than a few thousand on a system. For full disclosure, my system consists of a few hand-selected pieces I bought used about a decade ago and I spent less than a grand on it if you exclude the amount I spent on stuff for vinyl.
As for remasters, the rules of thumb are that audiophile remasters by record companies like Mobile Fidelity, DCC, Audio Fidelity, and Analogue Productions are probably going to be the best, though some of the earlier MoFi stuff may be questionable (though not bad, just not the best). SACD releases are usually good, with a few exceptions, but it's all because of the mastering, not the bogus "hi-res" designation. For records that were originally released between the mid 70s and the mid 90s, the first CD edition is usually the best. This was the era when most of the questionable recording practices from years prior had been dispensed with and before the loudness wars started. If the record was originally released before the mid 70s, then the quality of the source tapes used comes into play in a much bigger way. Early releases may have used inferior tapes, and later releases may have been casualties of no-noise and the loudness wars. For newer stuff the options are limited, and there is often only one mastering available, and if there is more than one it is either an audiophile release or isn't any different in quality than the original CD. There are exceptions, of course, and the best course of action is usually to search the Steve Hoffman forums for the consensus on what the best release is, just be forewarned that if Steve mastered any of those albums then that version will always be the consensus best version, though not without reason (he has a very warm style of mastering that I absolutely love, but he can be a bit smug about his abilities and there's some backlash online). If you're wondering about any releases from the classic rock canon, DM me and I can tell you, or just give you my Soulseek handle so you can look me up and grab it yourself.
Rov_Scam
20d ago
Well, I'm totally biased but Pittsburgh has most of the pros of the trendy cities and few of the cons. It's become a semi-trendy place to want to live if you believe Reddit, but the population isn't exactly exploding (the city population is holding steady and Allegheny County is actually losing population). It's also about double the size of Salt Lake and triple the size of Boise, and while it's similar in size to Austin, it's an older, more established city. What this means is that it has more big-city institutions than you'll find in any of those places and more of a big city feel rather than overgrown suburb (e.g. I don't think the Austin Symphony is playing for the pope any time soon).
As much as locals complain about the recent housing price increases, it's still nothing compared to the trendy cities. 500k gets you a four bedroom house in a highly desirable suburb with excellent schools. If you're paying more than that you're in a McMansion (or a mansion). And that's not just in a desirable neighborhood with good schools; that's in the most desirable area with the best schools. If you're satisfied with the former you're going to pay a lot less.
As an avid outdoorsman, the outdoor recreation is great. No, it's not as spectacular as certain areas out West, but an hour drive gets you pretty far out there and only the popular easy hikes are swamped. For example, Ohiopyle State Park is a popular area andit can be hard to find parking in town on a summer weekend. But as soon as you get away from town it's practically deserted even at the busiest times. A few years ago I was there Sunday of Memorial Day weekend up on the mountain and I saw a total of five other people, three of whom I knew. And the city is pretty hilly, with lots of wooded areas, so there's perfectly decent hiking without driving anywhere depending on where you live, though places in the city itself are going to be more crowded. The lack of spectacular views is only really a concern, though, if you're focused on "payoff hikes" that involve views. There are plenty of waterfalls, and the forests themselves are top-notch.
Getting beyond hiking and views, though, the mountains are first-class. I've mountain biked in several of the big name destinations across the country (Pisgah, the Rockies, the Western Slope, etc.), and the mountain biking in the Laurels is as good as it gets. I'll admit the skiing isn't exactly Colorado, but at least we have skiing. The real secret, though, is the whitewater. SWPA and Northern WV probably have the best whitewater anywhere in the world, and certainly the best whitewater a reasonable day trip from a major city. A lot of the Western states have more mileage, but most of it's only runnable during spring snowmelt. Here, we get enough rain that even the small stuff is runnable a few days after a heavy rain, and we have everything from Class II family floats to sketchy-as-hell steep creeks.
The population is largely comprised of people who CHOSE to be there. It's hard to quantify this, but the "vibes" between a town like this and a town that is filled with only the people who never left (think West Virginia as an extreme) are impossible to ignore if you've spent time in both.
Pittsburgh is unique in that it's a rust belt city that people actually want to move to. The declining population of the region is largely a function of the exodus in the 90s, during which an entire generation moved away. Their parents stayed, and now that generation is dying off at a faster rate than new arrivals can make up for. That being said, the declining population isn't the same as places like Cleveland or Detroit that look like bombed out shells of their former selves. There are a few ghetto areas like that, but most of the city population's decline is more due to declining household size than outright abandonment. At some point I'd like to do a survey of the region on here to evaluate its potential on a granular level, but I've got the music thing to do for now. But I'm actually dead serious when I think you should move here, because it's actually realistic and makes more financial sense than trying to pursue some pipe dream of living internationally or moving to some overly trendy city that's going to run into problems as a result of the population crush.
Rov_Scam
21d ago
I think an Amber is what you're looking for. Either that or a heavier lager. I heard one bartender at a brewery years ago describe Yuengling as a "balanced" beer, so maybe you want to go in that direction? I know Yuengling doesn't have the cachet it used to have since it's available in more states and the craft beer scene is much better than it was in the early '00s when Yuengling had its heyday, but it's still a decent beer you can always go back to. It used to be all I drank, and I'm about to go to the bar and I think I might get one for old time's sake. I should disclose that I drink beer almost every day and that my daily driver is Miller High Life, so I'm not a beer snob by any stretch of the imagination.
Rov_Scam
21d ago
It's an acquired taste. I personally wish it didn't have psychotropic effects because it would allow me to have more than one cup without feeling like crap. I've tried decaf and that actually tastes bad, so full-strength it is, though I rarely have more than one cup a day.
The issue isn't that they were doing their own preg checks, it's that they were operating and advertising a business that did it for other people for a fee. You can write your own will, for instance, but if you write wills for other people it's the unauthorized practice of law. Now, we can make the argument that that requiring a vet to do this is both unnecessary and outside the bounds of the statute, but there are two general problems I forsee with that.
The first is that the introduction of technology makes a lot of things that used to be the domain of trained professionals increasingly accessible to the general public. Take land surveying. Anyone of average intelligence can pull a deed from the courthouse, buy pro-grade survey equipment, and locate a pin, which is probably enough to do the trick if you're trying to see where you can put up a fence on your own property. But the field is deceptively complicated, and when the same guy decides to go into business for himself as a surveyor with no more training than basic YouTube tutorials, he's asking for trouble. The second problem is that most professional fields are so varied that it's impossible to define every specific thing one needs a license to do. The legislature can't run back into session every time someone comes up with a new medical procedure to make sure that you need a license to do it.
As for specific problems with allowing unlicensed people to do preg checks as a business, I can't comment on because I don't know anything about vet science. But if this is something that's plausible then the solution is to lobby the state legislature to clarify the law to specifically allow it; God knows the farm lobby in PA is powerful enough to make it happen if there's that much of a call for it and the only real opposition is from vets that don't like it. But the solution isn't to start a business doing it and ignore the state when they tell you to stop.
Rov_Scam
11d ago
I don't think China is going to stop selling to the US just because they might integrate the materials into weapons that will be sent to Ukraine. China is pro Russian, but not that pro Russian.
Rov_Scam
21d ago
The reason why microbreweries pile on the IPAs is because they're the easiest to make. The bitterness hides so much that there's a large margin of error. That being said, I have some friends who drink nothing but IPAs, so I understand why these places keep making them. I can tolerate them, but it's nice to have a beer I can drink more than two of.
Saying "Catholics and Christians" as though they were separate groups isn't the way to play to the Catholic vote. That's an obvious sign that the messaging is from an Evangelical who thinks we're heretics. As for TradCaths, they're a marginal group who are almost all voting for Trump anyway. I was raised Catholic (though my dad is a non-practicing Protestant), served as a Eucharistic minister, went to a Catholic college where half the faculty were priests and a lot of the students were conservative Catholics (and many of my friends became priests, or at least seminary dropouts), continue to attend mass semi-regularly, and I didn't even know TradCaths were a thing until a few years ago. I may have known vaguely of them but I couldn't differentiate them from the wackaloons who think that every pope since the Middle Ages is an antipope or the other wackaloons who ordain female priests. I went to a Latin Mass once when on vacation in South Carolina and while it was an interesting change of pace it wasn't something I'd want to replace the normal mass, more an interesting historical artifact that deserves preservation. The idea that this is a growing force in the Catholic church seems more an invention of internet conservatives than anything that has any serious influence in the church at large. My mother's much more devout than I'd be surprised if she's even knows these people exist.
The dominant strain of conservative protestantism in the US considers being a real christian to be the result of an individual conversion which is entirely compatible with Catholicism.
It can be, but it doesn't have to be. The sacraments of initiation begin shortly after birth, and confirmation is more a question of "do you want to continue being Catholic and complete your initiation" than "do you accept the Lord Jesus Christ as your personal savior". Most practicing Catholics are born into it and just go with the flow, and conversions aren't dramatic and require months of RCIA classes. My SIL converted from some Evangelical strain about ten years ago and she said the difference between the churches is stark, most notably the lack of altar calls, which most Catholics find weird as they put people on the spot and create subtle pressure to conform; she liked being in an environment where she could sit and mind her own business without feeling pressured. When I was a kid my mum would take us to "Road to Jerusalem"-type living history things, some of which were at these kinds of churches. My mother was pretty naive about Evangelicalism since it didn't really have a presence in Pittsburgh when she was growing up, and she was pretty taken aback by how aggressive the calls for conversion were if there was a prayer service involved. These were in stark contrast to the mainline protestant services we'd attended for various reasons over the years that were different but not outside our expectations for what church was supposed to be like, e.g. liturgy slightly different, more/less singing, longer sermons, different prayers, etc.
Rov_Scam
27d ago
I doubt that there's any universe where the Texas government collaborating with drug cartels is going to be electorally advantageous to Republicans.
Rov_Scam
28d ago
The first big case in this vein was Treyvon Martin and it wasn't a factor in the 2012 election. The first big police killing case of the current era was in 2014, a midterm year, and it didn't have much impact on that election. There were a number of others and they made have made an impact on some local elections, but I don't recall any precedent for it becoming a national issue at the electoral level. If it's 2020 and you're trying to manufacture an issue so you can get votes, there's already precedent to suggest that George Floyd isn't it. And there's nothing to suggest that the whole controversy even helped the Democrats. It resulted in a lot of Democrats saying a lot of dumb things about defunding police, and Biden had to specifically go against these people while campaigning. For Trump it was easy because all he had to do was keep to the party line that Floy'd death was a tragedy but there was no systematic problem with the police and we needed to stop the riots. Biden had to navigate dangerous waters. It's hard to see how anyone in May of 2020 would have thought that making a big deal out of Floyd's death would result in an advantage for Democrats.
Rov_Scam
28d ago
I don't really foresee any scenario where this could turn into a foreign policy crisis. If the law is allowed to go into effect then the chances that the Feds would try to do something to prevent enforcement against a court order are approximately zero. It's also likely that this law is a purely performative attempt to score points with voters without actually doing anything. I doubt Texas is going to try to attempt to deport Guatemalans to Mexico against the wishes of the Mexican government, and imprisoning illegals on their own dime is going to get really expensive really fast if there's anything more than a few token enforcement actions. Consider the worst case scenario — Texas officials try to deport someone to Mexico and end up getting arrested and detained by Mexican authorities. Now Abbot has to go to Biden hat in hand to get the State Department to negotiate with Mexico, and that isn't happening without a guarantee that he'll leave immigration enforcement to the Feds, because he certainly isn't going to turn this into a regular thing. At worst, Biden has every incentive to stall, making it look like he's doing everything he can while making sure that no settlement is reached until after the election. If Trump wins, then it's pretty much lights out for the detainees, because Biden has no incentive to continue negotiations, and the Mexicans are going to be disinclined to negotiate with Trump. But I doubt this even happens because, as you said, Abbot isn't stupid enough to get hoisted by his own petard.
Honestly, it seems to me like it's in Abbot's best interest for this law to get shot down. If it's upheld and he does nothing to enforce it, then it's just campaign fodder for Biden, who can point out that Abbot is all hat and no cattle. Same even if he does enforce it, because it's unlikely that Texas has the resources to make a dent in the problem. But if it's shot down then he can continue to bitch about the Feds and blame the courts from preventing him from taking the bull by the horns.
Rov_Scam
21d ago
You're pretty much in the same situation as me, then, and no, I don't think cutting it out or switching to decaf will change much. I usually drink one cup around 10 am, unless I'm unusually tired, in which case I'll start earlier and possibly have a cup in the afternoon. I also have dinner at my parents' house every Sunday and my mum and I have coffee with dessert. I don't think it affects my sleep in any way. I don't drink coffee at home on the weekends and only order it at restaurants if it's a sit-down place. I used to drink quite a bit of tea when I worked from home (usually about 2 cups a day, almost always in the afternoon) and the effects on sleep were similar. Honestly, having to get up and go into an office as opposed to working from home where I wasn't going to sleep past the start time no matter what made a much bigger difference in my sleep schedule than whatever effect a little bit of caffeine is having on me.
I says this as someone who's pretty critical of coffee culture generally; it's the only addiction that's not only socially acceptable to have, but socially acceptable to almost brag about having. There was a commercial a few years back where a guy repeatedly warned everyone not to talk to him until he had his coffee. If you say you can't function in the morning without coffee people will act understanding, if not sympathetic. Say the same thing about booze and people will start giving you pamphlets. I get that there's a difference in the relative risk levels, but an addiction is an addiction, and caffeine addiction is probably the easiest to treat (it can be done over a long weekend). I think the dividing line is whether you're doing it for the taste or for the psychotropic effect. If you're doing it for the effect then you'd be sucking down Folgers at home every day and wouldn't have a moment at work without a cup in front of you.
Rov_Scam
24d ago
Ike Turner's situation is unique, though. He had been out of the public spotlight for 20 years when the movie What's Love Got to Do With It came out, which portrayed him as a serial abuser. He then responded in possibly the worst way possible: He went on TV and called the movie a hack job while answering questions in such a manner as to suggest that every horrible allegation in the movie was completely true. If he'd have just kept his mouth shut it would have been forgotten about completely, but he had such an erratic personality that he became fodder for comedians and sketch comedy shows. Ike Turner impressions became a thing. It didn't help that he trashed Tina's solo career as well and held himself up as one of the true greats of rock and roll, which is technically true, but he's not exactly on the level of Little Richard or Chuck Berry. He finally offered a half-assed apology on Roseanne Barr's forgotten daytime talk show in 1999 (he only apologized under serious pressure from Roseanne), and after that point the music establishment basically forgave him and allowed him to join in on all-star specials and the like.
Rov_Scam
29d ago
When I was in the market I used a buyer's agent I knew, and he was able to give me discount but it was limited based on how much his agency required him to charge. I guess there could theoretically be independent agents, but it would be tough to do it without marketing support. My guess is commissions won't change that much.
Rov_Scam
20d ago
I used to run a high-adventure program for the Boy Scouts, and whether or not some sourt of "Trial by fire" wilderness experience would be considered abuse would depend on the nature of the experience. There's a big difference between pushing a kid's limits and actively abusing them. If I take a kid mountain biking and he's apprehensive about riding a certain line, I'll encourage him to ride it if I think it's within his ability based on my observation of him. If I don't think he can ride it and that it's going to end in a crash I'll tell him to walk it. If he's clearly freaking out at the prospect of riding it, I'll tell him to walk it. If it's a difficult line I'll probably won't even pressure the kid into riding even if I think he can ride it; I'll just tell everyone they can walk it if they'd like. It gets more difficult when, say, you take the kid on a long bike trip with limited or no opportunity to bail. In that case it's more a question of getting them motivated enough to keep pedaling rather than putting them in a situation that could lead to injury, and making sure they have enough snacks, water, etc. so that an acute event isn't going to happen. I mean, I always have outs in case of emergency, but a kid being tired isn't an emergency unless they're obviously incapable of continuing. Usually I just slow down the pace and take more frequent breaks to keep them moving, even if it ultimately takes longer. When they complain, I just ask what they expect me to do about it, and that usually shuts them up, especially when I tell them that an evac means an ambulance ride and a trip to the hospital that will likely end their time in the program.
The key is that the adversity be time-limited, controlled, and intended to develop skills and build confidence. Telling kids who are old enough that they'll be cooking dinner one night a week so they can learn the skills necessary to be adults is a lot different than just not feeding the kids. Making sure your kids get early exposure to outdoor adventure in the hopes that it will maintain fitness and social relationships while building a lifetime hobby is different than putting the kid in situations he's clearly uncomfortable with (and that come with high risk of injury) and regularly subjecting them to death marches in the woods. Some kids are just whiners who want to stay inside and play video games all day and not do anything that's going to make them mildly short of breath, and I never had any problem trying to toughen those kids up over their complaints. But it's important that you know where the line is, and that you make sure you never get anywhere near it. If you're moving to the Alaskan wilderness because you like the outdoors and want your kids to learn self-sufficiency, I don't think that's too much of a problem, as long as you understand the limits I outlined above. I certainly wouldn't put it anywhere near the level of the kind of stuff that's on the ACE quiz.
Rov_Scam
21d ago
Yep, and I agree that it's one of the best documentary series ever made. The only quibble I have is that it gives the Pacific war rather short shrift; in 26 episodes, one of which is dedicated entirely to the Dutch resistance, only 2 deal with the Pacific War exclusively (possibly 3, there may be one on Burma, I can't remember). This may be an artifact of it being a British series, but it prevents the series from being definitive.
Rov_Scam
29d ago
$5,000? That's ridiculous. When I had my own law practice I'd hire appraisers occasionally and my guy charged $400 and he actually went inside the place.
Rov_Scam
20d ago
Yes. Almost compulsively. I like being able to have my music organized the way I like it, and to be able to listen to it on my own terms. If I have financial hardship in the future I don't have to give up music entirely because I can't justify the cost of a subscription to a streaming service. While that isn't likely to happen, I generally don't trust the subscription model as a practical matter (though I admit this has nothing to do with why I don't use a streaming service). We kind of take it for granted that these services have a fairly representative collection of the entire musical corpus, in the way video streaming doesn't, but that's being held together by rights agreements that may or may not hold in the future. As we've seen with video streaming, the motivations of the streaming services and the content producers aren't necessarily symbiotic — Netflix and Amazon want to produce their own original content, while NBC and Disney want to run their own platforms. This hasn't happened in the music industry yet, but Spotify's exclusive contract with Rogan might portend the future. What happens when Taylor Swift signs an exclusive contract with Apple Music or whoever? What happens when Universal music decides to stop licensing their catalog and make it exclusively available on their own service? What happens when half of an artists discography is on one service and half of it on another, because different rights holders own different albums? Since you don't own the music, you only own the right to listen to whatever the platform has available during the month you've paid for in the subscription. If your favorite bands bolt, then you're out of luck for the future. This has the potential to be even more annoying than with video because even if you're willing to pay for multiple services, you won't be able to make playlists as easily. I'm not saying any of this will happen, but given how cheap hard drive space is I'd be wary of dumping my entire collection I already have just to have the privilege to pay for it, and be at the mercy of whoever is hosting it.
Rov_Scam
27d ago
There are more of these holidays that get limited governmental recognition than you can shake a stick at. Some congressmen proposes that March 22 is National Inland Waterway Workers Safety Awareness Day and it passes unanimously by joint resolution and nobody pays attention to it except a few trade organizations that want do distribute safety leaflets.
Rov_Scam
28d ago
We knocked it down because it was starting to normalize perjury to the point where it risked the legitimacy of the entire justice system. When you need grounds but don't have them,. you're incentivized to invent them,.and it's easy to get away with it when both parties agree to the charade. Even in the best case scenario where no one does this, you still have estrangement, with the added disadvantage of spousal rights remaining intact. So if your spouse decides to move out and abandon you, she's still entitled to the spousal share of your estate because in most states you can't just disinherit your wife.
Rov_Scam
4d ago
How far are you willing to take this, though? See what they're talking about in San Francisco relating to preventing grocery store closures due to "food deserts" and "underserved communities". Ensuring access to food is more important than ensuring that porn companies maximize their revenue (after all, they can still sell magazines and DVDs). I don't see how you can set a reasonable standard without opening the door to further regulation.
Rov_Scam
20d ago
While that's true, they still had to be able to afford the original mortgage payment. The complaint of millennials is that they can't afford to buy a house now, not that they can technically afford to buy it now but that it's unsustainable to own it more than a few years unless they can reduce their payments. Wile some boomers certainly benefited from interest rates going down, it isn't an assumption you can make at the time of purchase. It should also be noted that this was also a time when lenders expected you to have 20–30% of the purchase price in cash at closing for a down payment. It seems like down payments now are basically a formality. I mean, you need them, but when I suggested paying the traditional 20% for my house the general opinion was "nobody pays 20% anymore".
Rov_Scam
26d ago
The problem with this line of reasoning is that it ignores the reality on the ground. You can talk all you want about some theoretical shared history and kinship among whoever he considers white people, but it has little tangible effect on my everyday life. Compare me to an American black person — we speak the same language, share similar religions (i.e. we're both Christian), consume similar pop culture, eat the same food, etc.Why should I feel more of a sense of kinship with a Finn? He speaks a different language, has never been to my country, let alone my city, has no sense of shared civic responsibility, no sense of my country's history, and he's probably never even eaten peanut butter before. If a random black guy from Pittsburgh ends up in my living room, I guarantee I'll be able to relate to him better than a random guy from Finland with whom all I really share is skin color and the fact that our ancestors emigrated from central Asia some time in the distant past. At the very least, the black guy isn't going to complain when I offer him Miller High Life. This article is nothing more than the author trying to fabricate an intellectual justification for his own irrational prejudices.
She isn't entitled to half of your assets, because when you're married there are no "your" assets, only "our" assets (excepting what you had before you got married). So before she leaves she drains the bank account and there's nothing you can do about it. In modern times it's considered fraud to take assets in contemplation of divorce, but since divorce doesn't exist in this scenario, what are you going to complain about? And forget estrangement, she's still entitled to live in the house, so what if she decides to stay and make your life a living hell? She could give her boyfriend blowjobs in your easy chair while you're home and there isn't a damn thing you can do about it, except surrender the territory and move out.
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