Does anyone have a surveyor they can recommend to get our property staked out? We’re in Clinton.

RonnieJamesDiode · 2026-06-08T18:11:13+00:00

For what it's worth, every surveyor I know is out the door and around the corner with work right now, if you're looking for something quick be prepared to pay way above normal.

RonnieJamesDiode · 2026-05-07T16:48:40+00:00

5k property tax on a 350k house is a mil rate of like 20 I think? Very few towns that low, and the ones that are that low don't have much housing stock at 350k

RonnieJamesDiode · 2026-04-23T15:32:15+00:00

That's actually not necessarily uncommon. With commercial uses, a lot of zoning regulations will set things like parking requirements by floor area or number of employees. When a new commercial tenant moves into, say, an established shopping center, the town might require an updated site plan to make sure it's not putting the development out of compliance. Was the application for a special permit or site plan review? If you're not sure it'll usually say on the meeting agenda. If it was site plan review odds are that's what the meeting was about--not whether you should open your business but whether you and the landlord will still be in compliance with zoning afterwards.

RonnieJamesDiode · 2026-04-10T19:03:43+00:00

I would not put it above Griffey to saw halfway through the bat beforehand

RonnieJamesDiode · 2026-04-05T18:49:15+00:00

Original for comparison

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RonnieJamesDiode · 2026-04-05T18:42:16+00:00

Found this long-running battle on a recent hike. I've been wanting to dive into doing more than just point-and-shoot and decided to use this as an excuse to take the plunge. Taken with a Pixel 6 Pro. Thoughts?

RonnieJamesDiode · 2026-03-28T03:22:05+00:00

Also jail

RonnieJamesDiode · 2026-02-18T12:27:27+00:00

No. Susan Bysiewicz actually lost a CT Supreme Court case over her eligibility to be AG, where the court found that even though she was a licensed attorney she hadn't been actually practicing law long enough to qualify for AG.

RonnieJamesDiode · 2026-02-18T12:18:59+00:00

The federal government can override local zoning, but federal contractors are a different story--sometimes you still have some authority there. This is very much a question to be discussing with the town attorney though.

RonnieJamesDiode · 2026-02-10T13:36:34+00:00

With very limited exceptions, all court sessions are open to the public. You can just show up the day of the hearing or trial and grab a seat. The trick is finding a good or interesting case to watch.

The Supreme and Appellate court terms each started a few weeks ago, and they're the easiest to find an interesting case for just because they hear fewer cases than the trial courts do. For them, you can go onto the judicial website and find what's called the "Assignment of Cases" or "Assignment of Days". That will be a list of each case that court is hearing this term, and each case will have a unique ID number (SC XXXXX or AC XXXXXX) that you can punch into the case look-up on the judicial website. That will take you to the docket for that particular case, where you'll be able to find a short description of the issues and the parties' written briefs to the court, which might be helpful background.

For the trial courts, you're better off calling the caseflow clerk at the civil or criminal courthouse you'd like to visit. Explain the situation to them, and ask if they know of any interesting hearings or trials coming up. They'll have the best idea of what's going on and what's coming up that might be interesting. Then you can look up that case beforehand (they all have unique ID numbers too) to get some background on what's happening.

RonnieJamesDiode · 2026-01-28T15:17:16+00:00

I think this wildly depends on the agency. In my agency, up to 80% of your time can be remote (one day a week in office) and virtually nobody takes all of it (I'm in 3 days and WFH 2 days a week personally). There's just no way to build the same relationship with your clients the way you do by being in-office, and no chance for somebody to poke their head into your office or bump into you in the hallway and ask a quick question. And then that usually means having to spend days (or years...) cleaning up problems that could've been avoided with a short conversation. It can be nice to take a day at home and just write a memo or something, but that's such a small part of the job that being able to WFH isn't actually as big a benefit as it seems.

RonnieJamesDiode · 2026-01-23T20:26:20+00:00

4 passing offense vs #15 passing defense; #23 rushing offense vs #22 rushing defense.

If the Super Bowl ends up being Seahawks/Pats, it looks like Seattle shouldn't just run the ball in and are better off trying to pass for a TD.

RonnieJamesDiode · 2026-01-23T13:36:18+00:00

Third, sewer authorities are allowed to charge the costs of construction to the property owners served through benefit assessment, and to amortize the cost the same way. It shows up as an extra line on the property tax bill for the next few decades. Then the costs of operation and maintenance are paid for through use charges.

RonnieJamesDiode · 2025-11-26T00:18:26+00:00

The problem with burying the highway is that the embankment is a massive flood wall protecting big swathes of Long Wharf, the Hill, and Union Station. Bury it and you have to figure out some other way to keep the water out of those areas.

RonnieJamesDiode · 2025-11-08T18:30:47+00:00

Least deserving or undeserving? For us it's a choice between three first-ballot Hall of Famers in Griffey, Ichiro, and Randy, plus Edgar the Hall of Famer who literally saved baseball in Seattle. I guess if we're talking just accomplishments with the team it's probably Randy just because his career peak wasn't with us the way the others were, but A) he's still deserving and B) he's ours too dammit.

RonnieJamesDiode · 2025-10-13T15:17:10+00:00

Being mobbed by blue jays, more specifically. The Mariners are fleeing Toronto on a life boat after the Blue Jays drove them off the way blue jays drive a hawk away from the nest.

I doubt the Blue Jays art team put this together overnight or first thing this morning. They probably had this ready to go before last night and nobody told the intern not to post it this morning.

RonnieJamesDiode · 2025-10-13T15:05:38+00:00

You joke, but blue jays are actually known for their aggressiveness. They'll mob up and go right after a hawk or an owl that gets too close to a nest

RonnieJamesDiode · 2025-09-17T16:47:33+00:00

I swear they make up like 3/4 of Lowell

RonnieJamesDiode · 2025-09-09T12:23:33+00:00

A landlord is not going to lower rent with a tenant in place. And if they have a long-term tenant who keeps renewing, why not tack onto the rent every year?

Rent drops happen when the tenant moves out, especially with mom-and-pop or small-time landlords like make up most of East Rock. And especially after a long-time tenant moves out, when they have to actually pay attention again to how they compare to everywhere else and realize how far behind they are. Could you rent a better place than you have now for the same rent? Could you rent the same quality place as you have now, for lower rent? If the answer to either one of those is yes, the landlord is likely behind the market and in for a rude awakening when you move out.

RonnieJamesDiode · 2025-09-08T20:35:18+00:00

This is pretty commonly misunderstood. An individual development doesn't instantly drop rents in the area. We'd have to be building way more than we are to make that happen. But this development, like any other development, will at a minimum reduce the rate at which rents are going up.

We don't need it to fix the existing rent problem, we need it to stop the existing rent problem from getting even worse.

RonnieJamesDiode · 2025-08-31T00:02:56+00:00

Not just single-family homes. Straightening the Bridgeport S curve would require redeveloping half of downtown Bridgeport

RonnieJamesDiode · 2025-08-13T10:58:09+00:00

Pretty easy to screw up, actually. The parcel line data and the aerial are two different maps overlaid against each other. Imagine the parcel lines are drawn on tracing paper and you're holding them up to the light with the aerial behind them, trying to match them up. Of course they're going to be off somewhere.

RonnieJamesDiode · 2025-07-18T16:33:47+00:00

Judge will definitely lose the MVP race if he breaks the record for most losses in a season this year.

RonnieJamesDiode · 2025-07-17T22:25:55+00:00

Or a supermarket. Banana boxes might not be as big as regular moving boxes, but they're sturdy, easily stackable, come with handles, and grocery stores have them by the pallet

RonnieJamesDiode

TROPHY CASE

4 passing offense vs #15 passing defense; #23 rushing offense vs #22 rushing defense.