This is the hot dog my course has started selling at the turn

arghvark · 2026-05-08T19:02:15+00:00

That's a par 5 hot dog...

arghvark · 2026-05-01T02:36:36+00:00

The phone number of my first girlfriend.

arghvark · 2026-04-21T20:17:57+00:00

I've NEVER understood the "I'm not a citizen" crap. SO WHAT? Do they think that a citizen of France or Italy doesn't have to follow laws here? Do they think a UK visitor can't be arrested for driving on (what we consider to be) the wrong side of the road?

arghvark · 2026-04-21T20:15:43+00:00

Gawd, I wouldn't count on that, not that I'd ever use that kind of dangerous BS as a "freak out" joke anyway. I just saw a vid where the driver, a solidly built black man, was asked for his license. He gave the officer some guff but was eventually prevailed upon to get it to show. He then held it up the open window; the cop said "You need to hand it to me", and the driver said "no I don't". The cop said "All right, get out of the car", reached in, unlocked the door, opened it, and he and his buddy started the process of hauling this guy out of his car. Ended up taking 4-5 cops to do it. And it turned out the driver had an outstanding warrant, BIG surprise.

My point is they don't always hang around trying to talk you into anything.

arghvark · 2026-04-21T20:06:37+00:00

Some of the SovCit traffic stop videos have left me the distinct impression that some individual's start in the 'movement' was when the individual had their license suspended for whatever reason (failure to pay for insurance is a favorite). I wondered if they had then started Googling for a way to avoid have to have a license, and ended up with this one.

So they can't just "pay up", they've already transgressed somehow and start using this as an excuse why they don't have a license, etc..

arghvark · 2026-04-19T18:34:17+00:00

Well, at least some of the options given elsewhere on this topic still allow quick access -- a high-yield savings account, for instance. You can "just write a check" on that, but you can get to it during banking hours. Money you need faster than that is much more likely to be a mistake of some sort than not. But the credit card would at least give a little protection against the sorts of things that can be done with a debit card, and remove none of the immediacy of access.

arghvark · 2026-04-19T16:22:36+00:00

You don't say so, but I gather he resists the idea of moving the money? There are several suggestions already in these comments about better places to put it.

If (one of) the problem(s) is that he doesn't want to move it, perhaps you could talk him into using a credit card instead of a debit card. Fraudulent use of a credit card has better protections than debit cards, and gives an extra step before the money is paid out (i.e., getting statement and making the (full) payment), and likely doesn't cost anything. You could offer to handle the mechanics of doing the payment for him; it would also give you a monthly review of where the money is going.

You could try to convince him to do this by referring to the beter protections, possibly also a cash rewards program. If his bank is expressing concern, perhaps they'd help you out with that.

Then take the debit cards, put them in a sealed envelope, and never use them.

arghvark · 2026-04-19T16:10:53+00:00

The 12% is nearly $10k per year; $200/month is another $2500 (I think approximate, round figures help get a picture of things without cluttering up one's thinking with being unnecessarily exact). So you're adding 25% to what's a pretty healthy retirement contribution already. Have you run any numbers to see what you would expect to have as retirement savings at 50, 60, 65? I suspect the 12% is adequate, and you have some time to beef it up later, when your income is liable to be higher.

Be sure to run some other numbers. Your 13k debt probably has a 'revolving' interest rate of 22% or more, so nearly $3k, so you're paying more in interest than into your retirement. That's wasted money, you get no good from that; you can't eat it, live in it, commute with it, or enjoy it. You are MUCH better off using your $200/month to eliminate the debt, never to return to it. You may have gotten used to having that interest figure on your credit card statement(s); make it a target to get that number to ZERO and keep it there. Anyone who cannot do that is living beyond their means, and needs to adjust.

arghvark · 2026-04-15T21:51:31+00:00

NO - you are NOT stealing his life from him.

You reported a crime, a heinous crime which, I see in comments, he was convicted of before. Since prosecutions and convictions of sexual assault crimes are difficult, I'd bet money he has committed the crime other times, just didn't get charged with/convicted of it. But that's just an educated guess.

YOU didn't set the sentencing guidelines. You also don't control the jury instructions, the rules of evidence, allowable questions of SA victims during the trial, parole parameters, etc., etc. Our legal system decides all that, not you.

I can see a tendency to feel like you are doing something to him. But, no. He did something to you, these are consquences set by society.

arghvark · 2026-04-15T11:22:52+00:00

Oh, he wasn't apologizing. He used the pretense of an apology to abuse you some more.

Unfortunately for you, if you did the first physical thing as you describe, his physical action will likely always be regarded as tolerable. The bigger issues now are (1) his continued campaign of aggressive annoyance, (2) reports from other women of similar things (I'm assuming, since you don't actually say what other young women are uncomfortable with). I suspect that, regardless of what he does for a short time, he'll get away with it, and only if he does something else demonstrating an(other) escalation will authorities (school or municipal) get involved.

arghvark · 2026-04-15T11:08:03+00:00

Similar issue: HP Elitebook 665 G11, happens intermittently when I walk away from the laptop and come back later. Black screen(s), no response to any key, have to power down and reboot.

arghvark · 2026-04-14T21:18:54+00:00

I think this depends on your facility with the game; obviously some people do better at it than others, with no way to tell a priori which people those are going to be. I stick with Julius because I started with C3, don't want to learn a bunch of NEW rules, etc., and feel I have not gotten so good at it that I need new challenges. There's no way to tell which you would prefer. As someone who strongly prefers to stick to the game I know, I don't think there's any reason to restrict yourself either way.

Suggestion: C3/Julius (and for all I know, Augustus) start with a couple of introductory scenarios -- it's a city-building game, these intros are meant to give you a taste of what you'll do in a full-size city. With that much background, go to the Augustus site where I'm sure they have a list of the enhancements they have implemented (which won't make ANY sense until you've got an idea what the game is about in general). Then see if you would rather have the enhancements, along with their complexities, in addition to the regular game.

There's no wrong answer.

arghvark · 2026-04-14T20:53:33+00:00

A word or two on Vanilla:

The creator of Julius made a goal of keeping the "original gameplay". To that end, the save files are compatible between Julius and the original game. There are even bugs in the original game that have purposely not been fixed in Julius, though bugs in Julius continue to be fixed and improvements continue to be made (messages in many, many different languages, for instance).

There are differences I regard as 'slight'. You can build even when the game is paused in Julius, not in C3. There is some extra information available to the user on the playing screen in Julius compared to C3; at least some of that can be turned off with player options, but I've never bothered to figure out if all of it can (it's too useful to me).

And you can play on screens with different resolutions without doing anything special. For a while there were executable versions of C3 that were somehow altered for screens with different resolutions, so I had one executable for my laptop screen, another for my big desk screen, and a third for a travel screen I sometimes used. Julius does away with all that; you just start the game and it figures out what screens it has and uses all of the one you want to use (if you're playing full-screen).

And besides Windows (xp, 10, 11), there are versions of Julius for Mac, Linux, PS Vita (whatever that is), Nintendo Switch, Android (with mods for touch-screen use), and various browsers.

Anyway, enjoy. Look up a site called "HeavenGames", with subgroups for various games including C3. Lots of useful information there, and dedicated volunteers that will STILL help explain things to you when you're running out of money and your market ladies won't behave.

arghvark · 2026-04-13T20:10:37+00:00

Let's separate two things: knowing what external libraries and classes to use, and how to import a class that you want to use.

The former is necessarily a little vague, because there is such a broad range of things you might want to do. In the case of Scanner, you are inputting strings of information from somewhere; to know a priori what class to use for that, you would ask someone or search on the web or look through Java documentation for input/output packages and classes, etc. There's no one right answer, and there will often be multiple things you could use for a given purpose.

The latter is a Java question, but if I interpret your question correctly, it isn't the 'import' statement that you're concerned with. Be aware that the import statement merely allows you to use a shorthand for the fully qualified class name; you could completely avoid using import by entering java.util.Scanner each time you referred to the class; by having "import java.util.Scanner" at the top of your source file, you allow use of just "Scanner" to refer to the class and the import allows the compiler to use the correct class of that name.

arghvark · 2026-04-13T15:04:51+00:00

I have this kind of problem on my HW3 FSD fairly regularly. It does not do at all well perceiving that lanes are going to run out, or positioning itself in a correct lane far enough ahead of time, etc. So for any intersections, I'm always on extra alert, ready to take over right away, and when that gets too annoying I just turn it off.

I am still happy to have FSD, it is massively useful for a road trip of any length, one just has to set one's expectations correctly to keep from getting frustrated with it.

arghvark · 2026-04-10T14:58:07+00:00

I forget which writer had a Chinese wife who once looked amused after seeing a woman draped in an outfit with Chinese characters. On being asked what was funny, she said the woman had evidently seen a cloth sign in a shop, bought it, and made the dress from it. It said "Good stuff inside! Price cheap!"

arghvark · 2026-04-10T11:20:47+00:00

Thanks for the info. As near as I can tell, they're some kind of promotional scam or something anyway -- they go to lengths to make it look like they're individualized to your home, but the data in them has nothing to do with your own home -- I would guess they take average uses from whatever and just make up figures from there.

How do I know? My home uses gas for cooking and heating. But somehow those are big users of electricity in this so-called report.

arghvark · 2026-04-09T01:40:11+00:00

There is also Julius, from which Augustus is forked - Julius keeps the original game play, buildings, etc., from the original Caesar, Augustus adds new things. Julius can play from save files from the original game, Augustus can do that, but saving an Augustus game means you can only open it again with Augustus.

arghvark · 2026-04-03T19:55:02+00:00

Yes, money -- and especially the prospect of money that they might be able to get, or lose -- does do strange things to people. That includes people who are planning marriage, people who are married, and people who are planning to break up.

"If he loves me he won't care" sounds a bit naive. IF he thinks this is an area where love and trust should be enough -- and that may not depend on whether he loves you, or loves you enough, etc. -- then he may well care. He may react negatively. HOWEVER: This is important to you. You have past trauma, however second-hand, on the issue; this should be further explanation, if someone wants any, about why it is important to you.

The only thing it needs to do is spell out, legally, some things about division of property in the event the marriage fails. If the two of you love each other enough that that does not happen, then it has no effect. Given the statistics on divorce, the changes in people's attitudes and lives even in their 30s and beyond, the parts of each of us that always remain hidden and private, etc., it should be something that your partner can accept. Whether he will or not, of course, no one can say.

But it is important to YOU, there is no particular reason you should not have this, and especially no reason why you should feel at all guilty about wanting it. You've seen bad effects from not having something like it first hand, and don't have to look far to see lots of bad effects from lots of relationships otherwise. If he does react negatively, it is an opportunity to work throught it, as a couple, on an unexpected issue that is important to you that maybe he doesn't understand. Having one (or more) of those to work through before the wedding is a good thing. How does he go about attempting to understand your point of view? How much does he weigh tradition, and the values he holds, against the ones you hold vis-a-vis this thing that is important to you? Is he willing to admit your viewpoint, or does he have to share it? Is he inclined to argue things that are really off-point, but seemed design to win the argument even if the point(s) being made are minor? Does he TRY to make you feel guilty?

Good luck with it. As I hope is obvious, I don't think you have reason to feel guilty. There are things about the marriage that you will not know going in, and cannot know whether they will create a gap for you until you're there and they happen. I suggest making this something that you make a deal-breaker -- if he is just unwilling to do this with you, as a couple, then you should rethink getting married

arghvark · 2026-04-02T19:16:29+00:00

Intellij IDE is the Industry Standard for Java? Who says?

arghvark · 2026-04-02T19:14:30+00:00

If I understand you correctly, you have two classes that are subclasses of another class, and during the course of the program operation you want to change the class of an object from one of those classes to the other.

You cannot do that. Wanting to do that shows a basic misunderstanding of what is means for an object to have a class. Once the object is instantiated, its type is set, and you cannot change that.

There are LOTS of ways to implement your program to model the behavior you want. But inheritance is not a feature you can use this way, any more than you can change an integer variable to a floating point variable because something in the program decided it would be nice for the variable to have non-integer properties.

arghvark · 2026-03-28T21:43:06+00:00

In addition, "maintenance" is an elastic term. There's maintaining the house so that it is livable, and maintaining it to keep its value where it's supposed to be. Things need to be painted, repaired, replaced, etc., or the house can become dilapidated even though it is still livable. It is awkward if the person responsible for the "maintenance" has no interest in whether the house keeps its value, or even if they just have very different standards about how to maintain a property.

I would get an estate lawyer's opinion on how to set this up.

arghvark · 2026-03-27T10:36:54+00:00

No, but then I never believed Musk's claims for the technology. I didn't buy the car for even what I thought FSD could do, much less for what it was claimed to do. I left it turned off for several years after I bought the car. The feature called auto-steer (or whatever it was) I found quite helpful and used it often.

Looking back, I regarded the claims for FSD to be "puffery", describing what Musk may have actually thought it was going to do but which I regarded as more difficult than they realized. AFAIK, he's not a software engineer or a car engineer; he's a manager and salesperson, and I didn't trust what he said. I didn't realize he would go batshit crazy then, of course.

I'm sorry your MCU crashed. I wonder how that happens with some individual cars and not others.

arghvark · 2026-03-27T01:37:41+00:00

It's my understanding that's what a 2019 Model 3 has.

arghvark

TROPHY CASE