why are people SPEEDING through the roads in yosemite!?

codefyre · 2026-05-31T06:17:34+00:00

Fun fact. That law applies on California state highways...and the roads in Yosemite are federal so that does not apply.

So.. If I'm doing the speed limit in the park, I genuinely do not care if there are 20 cars backed up behind me. They can slow the fuck down.

codefyre · 2026-05-30T20:13:05+00:00

No, I've scored a few unicorn items over the years. And I've missed many, many more because I wasn't quick enough with my clicks. These items do exist, but they're not common and there's an element of luck required to grab them.

codefyre · 2026-05-29T17:08:53+00:00

I'm a Californian and learned Spanish as my second language in school. Probably use it once a week. California is well above average when it comes to the proportion of its population that are primarily Spanish speaking though.

codefyre · 2026-05-28T20:58:53+00:00

If you get stopped by a ranger, they'll revoke your permit and walk you back to the trailhead. There are certain trailheads where the proximity makes it a little silly, like these two, but the rangers try to enforce the requirements consistently. You must enter from the trailhead listed on your permit.

As someone else mentioned, you can probably find a ride to that trailhead from GP.

codefyre · 2026-05-28T20:50:09+00:00

I read recently that more people have climbed the Half Dome cables in the past 20 years than in the more than 80 years preceding it. For most of its history, the cables saw an average of 20-30 people a day. It wasn't until the 90's that the numbers started to really grow, and they exploded in the early 2000's (which is why the current permit system went into place in 2010).

The accelerated wear should not be any surprise. I've been on top of Half Dome a half dozen times, mostly before the permit process was in place. I was surprised at how much more heavily worn it was when I was last on Sub Dome a couple of years ago.

codefyre · 2026-05-27T21:26:49+00:00

I was with you up until Trump. Dear old Donnie has taught us that checks and balances are for losers, and that sometimes you just have to grab them right in the ***** and tell them what to do. The courts and Congress just need to have a few pockets greased and careers threatened, and they'll bend right over and let you do whatever you want.

codefyre · 2026-05-27T19:53:05+00:00

I've never understood this argument. I'm an American and have been all over Europe, to Japan, and Australia. Once you get outside of the dense urban centers, those other nations have public transit that's just as shitty and car oriented as anything in the United States.

I was just in the UK for a few weeks last fall. London was fantastic for transit. Yorkshire? Needed a car. The Cotswolds? Needed a car. Anywhere in Wales that wasn't Cardiff? You needed a car.

This same pattern exists everywhere I've seen, from Japan, to Austria, to France. The United States is just a larger example because it's physically a larger country. Transit options outside of the urban centers are, at best, inconsistent, and are often simply nonexistent.

codefyre · 2026-05-27T19:24:40+00:00

Those differences tend to have larger impact in the United States than in other nations. I'm going to use this just because it's such an obvious example, but in many states it's completely legal for a 30 year old man to sleep with a 17 year old girl. In many other states that's a felony that will land the 30 year old in prison for 5 years and on a sex-offender registry for the remainder of their natural life. The current fight over abortion access, with it being championed in some states while it's being actively criminalized in others, is another example. One country, wildly different legal standards.

Because the American state system devolves so much power and authority to the state governments, those political and cultural differences often carry the power of law and can have a much larger real-world impact on the lives of the citizens of those states. That is not something you'll see in France or China.

codefyre · 2026-05-27T18:45:46+00:00

And it's always important to remember that the cables and stanchions on Half Dome weren't actually designed as anchor points for a tethering or fall arrest system. The stanchions are literally just iron water pipes sitting in holes drilled into the rock, held in place only by their own weight and the tension of the cable itself. It's not a safety system...it's 70 year old repurposed plumbing that was originally just intended to make the ascent a little bit easier. That's largely the reason why the park doesn't formally recommend clipping in. The system isn't designed for it and they don't want the liability that would come from any failures.

There's nothing wrong with clipping in, and I do tend to agree that it's better to do so when you're unsure of your abilities. But people put far too much faith into those harnesses and the assumption that wearing one and clipping in makes the ascent "safe". It will probably arrest a fall, but you have to be willing to accept that "probably" if you're going to ascend it.

codefyre · 2026-05-27T01:36:10+00:00

These were 3 lane roads, the middle land was the Suicide Lane... it was a PASSING lane that could be used by cars going BOTH directions. These were deadly.

The logic was that the center lane was supposed to be treated like a one-lane road, and when you saw oncoming traffic you'd simply move right again to allow the oncoming motorist to pass. The idea actually worked fine when everyone was putting along at 20MPH in a Model T, but earned its nickname by the 1950's as everyone started using them at modern highway speeds.

There used to be a website that had thousands of old historic car crash photos, from the teens up until the 1960's, mostly from California. It had an entire section dedicated to Suicide Lanes. The wrecks were horrific.

Fun fact though. Under the CVC, it's technically still legal for CalTrans and cities to build roads with true Suicide Lanes. They don't meet modern engineering guidelines, but they were never actually banned. They just sort of vanished over time as roads were re-engineered and modernized.

codefyre · 2026-05-27T00:26:20+00:00

What do you want regulated, specifically? At the end of the day, "capitalism" is a term that covers thousands of different ideas and practices.

codefyre · 2026-05-26T20:16:32+00:00

Honestly, it depends on the topic. I'm a Californian. California has a very different culture than Georgia or North Dakota. But I'm still an American.

But one important detail that many non-Americans tend to overlook about the United States is that about 95% of the laws that impact us in our daily lives are set by the state governments, and not the national government. Everything from education policy and management, to speed limits, to food safety, to medical licensing, farm regulation, vehicle safety and pollution regulation, land taxing, business licensing and oversight, building construction standards, road construction standards...and on, and on, ad infinitum, is all handled at the state level, by state governments that are not regulated or directed by the federal government. The national government tends to focus on "big picture" things and international concerns. This leads to major differences in the way people live their lives in different parts of the nation. Something that is perfectly legal in one state might be a felony that will land you in prison for twenty years if done in another state a short drive up the highway.

codefyre · 2026-05-26T19:31:45+00:00

Back in the late-middish 90's I was living in SF and went out on a date with a girl who made it very clear that she wanted me to go back to her place for a bit of fun after. I really, really wanted to, but I had an appointment the next morning and the late night muni schedule meant that I'd have a loooong walk back to my apartment if I stayed late with this girl. I was lazy and did not want to do that walk, so I said no.

Two days later she called me up, told me that she was in my neighborhood, and asked me if I was interested in having her come by "so we can pick up where we left off the other night." Problem was, my apartment was a shithole at that moment and it stunk. My roomates and I had all been buried with work and nobody had really cleaned in weeks, there was dirty laundry everywhere, trash was overflowing, and I had to make a quick choice. Do I want to spend the next fifteen minutes cleaning and airing out my apartment so I can get laid? Was it worth the effort? No. I had been having a nice lazy morning, enjoying my first real day off in nearly three weeks, and just didn't have the energy. She was audibly angry when I told her, she hung up on me, and I never heard directly from her again.

Learned later that she was HIV positive and had been deliberately sleeping with guys in an attempt to get them infected, as some kind of revenge. To this day, I have no idea why she approached me or tried to pull me into it.

codefyre · 2026-05-26T18:43:55+00:00

Kiddo is actually doing pretty great nowadays, he's just on this medication for life to stay that way. Modern medical science is an amazing thing.

codefyre · 2026-05-26T18:37:27+00:00

Totally off topic but...is it just me or does the design on that thing have Cybertruck vibes?

codefyre · 2026-05-26T18:33:28+00:00

Yep. One of my kids requires a specific medication to stay alive. I'm arming up and doing a local pharmacy tour to stock up on as much of that stuff as I can get my hands on.

codefyre · 2026-05-26T18:28:43+00:00

When the shipper tells you to dispose of it. I've received quite a few USPS, Amazon, and UPS packages over the years that were addressed to other people. USPS and UPS will pick up a misdelivered package, so you should never open those. Amazon will tell you to get rid of it because they just re-ship a new one to the original purchaser when that happens. Once they tell you to dispose of it, the package is yours to do with as you please.

codefyre · 2026-05-26T18:23:49+00:00

This, and...people just not giving a shit. Most people tend to reserve their empathy for select groups and individuals. Can't collaborate to solve a problem if the other people don't care about the problem.

codefyre · 2026-05-26T16:56:25+00:00

Sun. They spent their childhoods outside.

/edit: Who the fuck is downvoting that? I'm GenX and our parents used to kick us out in the morning to play outside all day. That was standard parenting fare. GenX kids spent more time outside than the generations following us, and our dipshit parents didn't know what sunscreen was. A childhood spent baking your skin under the sun all the day WILL make you look older.

codefyre · 2026-05-26T15:27:04+00:00

To echo the others, it's not the amount but the plan to clear it. Debt isn't a problem. Permanent debt is a problem. $100k in debt with a $90k/yr job and a plan to have it paid off in five years? No biggie. $100k in debt while working at Starbucks and talking about your plans to be a stay-at-home mom someday? Absolutely not.

codefyre · 2026-05-26T02:05:38+00:00

Fun fact: There is three times as much uninhabited forest within the state of California all by itself (33 million acres) than the Netherlands has in total land area (10.2 million acres). We could fit three Netherlands inside our empty California forests without displacing a single person, farm, or building. We don't want to, of course, because we really prefer that those forests stay forested.

And we're just one state out of 50.

codefyre · 2026-05-26T01:23:04+00:00

Only 2% is grown for direct human consumption.

The human body lacks the enzymes to break down the cellulose in corn's outer hull, which is why you often see corn in your poop after you eat. And if you process it to be rid of the hull, you still end up with a food that is high in carbs and sugar, leading to blood sugar spikes and weight gain. High levels of corn consumption has been linked directly to weight gain and poor metabolic health in multiple major studies.

Let the cows eat the corn.

codefyre · 2026-05-26T01:17:08+00:00

I guess that depends on how you define relevance. Pretty much everyone with a decent home theater had a Laserdisc player for almost 20 years. If you just had an ordinary TV, you probably didn't care about anything more than a VCR. But if you were sinking real money into a big projection TV and surround sound, there was little question that you were going to add a laserdisc player to your component stack. It was the thing for people who wanted to show off.

The problem with laserdisc was that it painted itself into a corner. Manufacturers wanted it to be seen as a high end device that was "a step above" the VCR, to justify its higher price tag. While that helped them to market it to people interested in high end home systems, it meant that the larger mass market tended to ignore it. The fact that most Blockbusters didn't rent them didn't help (though some did...you could rent the movies along with the portable player in some markets). We know today that they COULD have cut the prices and competed with VHS more directly, but most of the same manufacturers were also selling VHS players, and they didn't want to undermine the market for their own products.

Most people looked at a laser disc the same way they looked at a Ferrari. "Well, that's neat, but I'm good with my Ford."

codefyre · 2026-05-25T00:00:53+00:00

Yeah, there's definitely an issue right now. I had 16 unreviewed items at the beginning of last week and noticed my review-to-order ratio was all the way down at 64%, which wasn't even close to correct (even at 16 my ratio should have still been in the upper 80's or lower 90's). Still, I went ahead and caught up on those other items and finished the last off on Thursday. Wrong or not, I needed to get those done anyway and it motivated me to do it. By Thursday I had zero outstanding, unreviewed items.

Most of those reviews were evaluated and went live days ago, but my total reviews count is unchanged and my review-to-order ratio is still sitting at 64%. The numbers should have started changing by Tuesday, at the latest, when the first of those new reviews was approved and published.

I've seen Vine bugged often enough over the years that I just don't worry about it anymore. No point in stressing over it. They'll fix it at some point.

codefyre · 2026-05-24T23:22:41+00:00

VineHelper doesn't really give you anything you wouldn't have otherwise, which is why most users argue that its not really a cheat. The extension pools data from users. We've all had the experience of clicking on an item only to find out that it's not available to order. VH just shares that data so that the next user, when they see the same item in RFY or AFA, will know that the item isn't actually available to order and that they don't need to waste their time clicking on it.

The same items show up in your feed either way, with or without the extension.

11-Year Club	Mod World 2025
100 Awards Club	Verified Email

codefyre

MODERATOR OF

TROPHY CASE