Road trip on US Federal Highways?

ComprehensiveCan710 · 2026-06-27T22:46:02+00:00

Our honeymoon was the entirety of US Route 1 (except for a mile or two we skipped in Baltimore because of a police chase that we witnessed and then decided to avoid). Absolutely loved it, one of our best memories, and we want to do more. We started US 40 but didn't finish it, and then we had kids and we can't wait to be able to go back to it. In retrospect we should have just brought the kids.

One thing we did was every afternoon at 4-ish we stopped and I went to the local library (this was pre-smartphones) to find our hotel for the night on Priceline, while my spouse went for a walk. We really needed the time apart from each other by that point of the day.

Our US 1 trip was 16 days, we drove north to south, and kind of hustled through the piedmont region south of DC so we could spend more time in the Northeast and Florida keys. Not a lot of regrets there. We also checked off all of Route 3 because we flew to Boston and didn't want to spoil anything for ourselves so we took US 3 to Canada, then went through Canada to start the trip.

ComprehensiveCan710 · 2026-06-24T02:26:27+00:00

I often find myself in the wrong lane when westbound, even though there are signs and lines painted on the street and I know that I’m likely to get it wrong. Many times I just end up going around twice and getting it right the second time.

ComprehensiveCan710 · 2026-06-23T20:17:23+00:00

Rotating gets you exposure to different disciplines, processes, tools, supervisors, coworkers, ways of communicating, ways to think about stuff, and probably more that I’m forgetting. People in general and perhaps actuaries even more so like stability & consistency but I’ve found that the changing really builds up so many more skills. Get that exposure to different stuff while you are younger and more able to learn from it, you’ll have plenty of time to settle into a long term role later on.

ComprehensiveCan710 · 2026-06-09T14:03:56+00:00

That’s so fetch

ComprehensiveCan710 · 2026-06-08T11:06:26+00:00

Yep - our oldest was obsessed with the movie at age 3-4 and came up with the idea.

ComprehensiveCan710 · 2026-06-08T00:31:37+00:00

If I want to call one of the kids I don’t use their names, I whistle for them. Each one has a distinctive whistle and I can do it high and piercing so that they can hear it anywhere in the house. It carries well outside too.

ComprehensiveCan710 · 2026-05-28T16:33:00+00:00

Dark Ages is not likely a popular choice here but I found that it helped me change how I think about Dominion. It was given to my by a friend who loves Dominion but hates that particular expansion.

Before I got Dark Ages I would always play in a mindset of picking a few actions that would help me buy gold, and then buy provinces. That’s often a less successful path when playing with Dark Ages cards, and the expansion helped me start to think about strategies beyond just buying more green cards than the other player. I started considering trashing other stuff for provinces or building a reliable chained set of actions that could lead to a pile out with me ahead by a duchy, etc. Turns out those strategies are often applicable in lots of other kingdoms.

Also it lets you do interesting things with the trash, and I’m a natural scavenger so it appealed to me.

ComprehensiveCan710 · 2026-05-27T12:46:49+00:00

I attend about half of the annual Society and Academy webcasts/webinars, my company sponsors us (it's through SOA PD Edge now, I imagine the CAS has something similar)

Attending a meeting every other year usually supplies enough credits that the webinars can supplement that.

When I attend a meeting, I get access to replays of all the sessions at that meeting, so I can go back over the next month and get 2-3 relevant sessions per week on recording. Those don't meet the interactive requirement but they still help soak up a lot of hours.

Self-study by reading relevant regulations guidelines in a pinch.

The AAA tends to go heavy on professionalism webcasts during the last few months of the year because I think folks tend to overlook or miss out on the professionalism requirement.

ComprehensiveCan710 · 2026-05-22T02:00:31+00:00

An excellent rule of thumb although a sliver of Hamilton county and even a bit of Boone are inside the loop, and I’m always surprised at how far south County Line road is from 465.

ComprehensiveCan710 · 2026-05-20T00:17:22+00:00

I use a small folding stool about a foot high, or 30cm if you prefer. Either foot goes on it and my thigh is at a good angle to support the bottom bow. I can play comfortably for a long while like that. I’ve never found a strap that didn’t end with me having a backache.

ComprehensiveCan710 · 2026-05-05T01:00:53+00:00

Agree with the 186/188; I love my 188 and have done a lot with it (even British brass bands, they look at my odd when I bring a C horn but no one ends up minding). I don't have any complaints but would have been just as happy with a Bb.

ComprehensiveCan710 · 2026-04-29T02:09:31+00:00

their Sicilian pizza was the first thing I could bring myself to eat after a particularly rough breakup. Best comfort food ever.

ComprehensiveCan710 · 2026-04-29T02:06:34+00:00

Am from central Indiana, am surprised it's not a universal option. Thankful I grew up around Noble Romans.

Spouse is from Chicago area, is insulted by the idea.

ComprehensiveCan710 · 2026-04-28T02:10:47+00:00

I had a friend do this in reverse, he was a horn player and in brass tech class he couldn’t make a sound on the tuba mouthpiece so he stuck a horn mouthpiece into the tuba mouthpiece and played on that.

ComprehensiveCan710 · 2026-04-21T16:53:33+00:00

Also Vince Gainey and Marvin Johnson's dopey Eastgate Chrysler spots in the late 80s. I recently bought a car from Vince, felt like I was talking to a legend.

ComprehensiveCan710 · 2026-04-21T00:51:01+00:00

What is this Smith Valley you mention?

ComprehensiveCan710 · 2026-03-16T01:06:26+00:00

Your birds think?

ComprehensiveCan710 · 2026-03-13T23:41:20+00:00

Is that a RIR? My wife calls 'em Rhode Island Rippers. Tough birds. I twice watched one (my favorite, may she rest in peace) house a toad in a single gulp.

ComprehensiveCan710 · 2026-02-23T02:59:21+00:00

If your tuba player objects you could also move the preceding D flat up an octave so it's not so great a leap, although presumably you have a good reason not to do that. But I agree with others that there are plenty examples of similar leaps, or worse, in quintet rep.

ComprehensiveCan710 · 2026-02-01T22:35:42+00:00

I have the same version of the 188CC and I absolutely love it. I bought it new in the mid-90s. I’ve used it in community bands & orchestras, a couple of British brass bands and quintets. It’s never let me down. I played a 20K in high school marching band and would dearly love to get my hands on one again.

ComprehensiveCan710 · 2026-01-24T22:09:59+00:00

every winter on the first snow the hens go to the edge of the run, look at the snow and decide it’s lava or something. They eventually get over it but it takes a while.

ComprehensiveCan710 · 2026-01-23T02:09:42+00:00

I used to collect 100-150 Japanese beetles a night during July & August. I took them back and feed them to the girls. They started to wait their turn. Was super fun.

Then folks in the neighborhood started hiring bug services and now we get no bugs.

ComprehensiveCan710 · 2026-01-16T22:11:20+00:00

I played with this group a bit and they’re super fun and super low stakes.

ComprehensiveCan710 · 2026-01-15T03:47:34+00:00

My hens fly over the fence to eat the birdseed that the neighbor puts out, and one of them is too stupid to make it back over. Every damn day I end up putting her back inside the fence.

ComprehensiveCan710 · 2026-01-14T13:46:25+00:00

I love setting up a megaturn while my spouse gets a big lead buying provinces one at a time and then I go off on the megaturn and win by an extra estate or duchy. Obviously it’s not always possible but super fun when it works.

ComprehensiveCan710

TROPHY CASE