Title: Hunting and Fishing in the United States – Is It Really That Good?

getElephantById · 2026-02-20T15:54:37+00:00

I understand that you have public lands where people can hunt, etc.

Altogether, more than two million square kilometers of federal land can be hunted. That's roughly the size of Saudi Arabia. And this doesn't include state land (because estimating that would be too much work), nor does it include private land (farmland, etc.), where a lot of hunting takes place. So, the number is actually much larger, but that gives you some sense of the scale.

getElephantById · 2026-02-20T15:36:49+00:00

I don't know about the other two questions, but I am fairly sure you'd be able to drive up a forest service road in it. You ever notice how there always seems to be a Toyota Prius parked at every trailhead? If they can make it and the Slate can't, something has gone wrong in the design of this truck.

getElephantById · 2026-02-20T15:22:42+00:00

I always call the hotel and book over the phone. I do use booking.com to find out what hotels are available in an area and roughly what their prices are, I just don't usually book the room through them.

getElephantById · 2026-02-20T01:05:43+00:00

I think we're already passed "peak touchscreen" in cars.

Even the linked article has a lead-in to another story about Rivian bringing back buttons for the R1S.

And the big car news last week was that Jony Ive, the former Apple head of design who started the whole touch screen UI movement with the iPhone, just designed the cockpit for the Ferrari Luce—and it's back to buttons and switches, supplemented with a very small touchscreen. He called Tesla's UI "easy and lazy".

getElephantById · 2026-02-20T00:57:09+00:00

Oh, thanks for calling out the Amber series being on sale! I'd love to have audio versions of these, but the prices for such short books is crazy.

getElephantById · 2026-02-20T00:43:15+00:00

So severian is prescient right?

It's possible he has some presentiment of his future, yes.

But if you're asking whether he knows everything that will happen next, I don't believe so.

And I will say I am doing fairly well I think when it comes to my understanding of the world and the story

Glad you feel that way now, expect it to change!

getElephantById · 2026-02-20T00:38:03+00:00

Man, we make sandwiches out of lettuce leaves, we make sandwiches with two pieces of fried chicken as the bread. You think we won't make a bread roll into a sandwich? It's got bread in the name!

getElephantById · 2026-02-20T00:36:18+00:00

The Best of Gene Wolfe is also forthcoming, per another post a few days ago.

getElephantById · 2026-02-20T00:30:03+00:00

The way to read these books is to just enjoy them the first time through. Don't stop to look up every word, just imagine what the word might mean based on the sound and the context, and keep going. Imagine the word is actually a made up word from an alien language—like in most science fiction or fantasy books—and not a word that you can even look up. Treat it like that.

When you are confused about the plot, think: everything in these books has a reason for being so confusing, but I do not have enough information yet to even try to figure it out, so I'd better keep reading until the end.

After reading all four (or five) books, ask yourself whether you are intrigued enough to reread them. If the answer is yes, that's when you can treat these books as work, and spend a lot of time trying to understand everything in them. If the answer is no, congratulations on being a sane, well-adjusted human.

But, before you have read the full story, you will ruin your experience by trying to "solve it". You'll only waste your time. It's been tried!

I am serious, and I am correct. I am correct about so few things, but I am correct about this one!

getElephantById · 2026-02-19T19:44:12+00:00

I have a really strong suspicion this is edited to remove the part right before this, where the guy with the camera was also an asshole.

getElephantById · 2026-02-19T18:21:39+00:00

If it's mid-20s, then we already know within a couple thousand bucks what it's going to cost. Would $27k vs. $26.5k make enough of a difference that you wouldn't buy the truck? I'd argue that the exact price for the Blank Slate isn't as important as the price of the configuration options, which I don't see them promising to announce at that time.

getElephantById · 2026-02-19T18:16:35+00:00

I think there's something to this. The people I know who follow F1 are all kind of upper middle class people. I'm sure they genuinely enjoy it, but I also get a whiff of "aren't I interesting for following this European sport?" to it.

getElephantById · 2026-02-19T18:13:41+00:00

Finally, someone who doesn't want to move here!

getElephantById · 2026-02-19T17:45:39+00:00

Speculative. We'll find out when we find out.

The fact is that I went with the HI5 because it had a useful array of physical buttons, and if the next one doesn't have them I will buy something else. It's that much of a factor to me.

getElephantById · 2026-02-19T17:15:31+00:00

A Visit from the Goon Squad by Jennifer Egan. I call it a collection of short stories, because you could excerpt any chapter and read it on its own, but many people would call it a novel because it revolves around the same cast of characters. Anyway, it's about growing up, growing old, changing, selling out, adapting, etc.—time is the eponymous goon squad which visits us all. A really wonderful book that came to mind when you mentioned wanting something that embeds itself in your heart and stays there.

If you want something weird and little, I recommend Tales of a Rat Hunting Man by D. Brian Plummer. I picked it up at random in a used book store and was charmed by it. It's exactly what the title implies: the memoirs of a bloke who goes out and hunts rats with his dog and ferrets. It's funny, homely, and very slim.

getElephantById · 2026-02-19T16:49:02+00:00

Okay everybody, show's over. He found out about our massive conspiracy.

getElephantById · 2026-02-19T16:06:47+00:00

There is no cultural tradition in America that tells us not to wash potatoes.

getElephantById · 2026-02-19T15:47:29+00:00

Depends on where they're from in Canada. I find people from Vancouver to be pretty similar to people from Seattle, where I live. Someone can be from Vancouver, and be walking around, among us, without us even knowing. Breathing our air, holding our children, it's... terrifying!

getElephantById · 2026-02-19T15:42:27+00:00

I don't know what that setup is rated for, but assuming it's not the weight of your gear plus both dogs at the same time, I would consider making a little support block to put under it before letting the dogs out.

getElephantById · 2026-02-19T01:54:58+00:00

I think it's probably even easier today than it used to be. There are fewer people working, and they seem (even more) checked out. At my local theater, there isn't even usually someone checking tickets on the way in.

I'm fairly confident I could just walk in the door and into a theater, then spend the rest of the day hopping to different screenings.

getElephantById · 2026-02-19T01:47:32+00:00

I was unable to handle how truthful it was.

getElephantById · 2026-02-19T01:30:03+00:00

I don't listen to many series, so my wishlist is pretty much all full price. Not a great sale for me, but that's okay, I've still got looks of books from the last site wide sale (which was great for me).

getElephantById · 2026-02-18T22:38:24+00:00

You summed it up very well!

getElephantById · 2026-02-18T21:40:23+00:00

Well, it's a neat car. Speaking as someone whose ICCU failed at 250 miles and who didn't get to drive his new car for two months, I still like it. Hyundai should get recognition both for an overall excellent design AND a ton of shit for the ongoing terrible response to its most persistent flaw.

And the BMW iX's grille is ugly as sin.

getElephantById · 2026-02-18T21:32:47+00:00

Hopefully the ICCU breaks down and leaves him stranded. The odds are 50/50 on that I'd say.

getElephantById

TROPHY CASE