New Scaratings

I believe Dante smuggled it out of Arabia in the early 1600s.
Hmmmm... or maybe that was the Coffee Drinkers' Thread...

It must have been the Coffee Drinkers' thread. Chip the bartender doesn't allow any smuggling.

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.......................................... "Smuggling...? Hmm... Goodnight I'm going to bed to think about it."

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"The game is afoot."

IT WAS 94 YEARS AGO TODAY... The Great Molasses Flood... http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Boston_Molasses_Disaster

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/```\
(o\_!_/o)

What a waste of molasses. Just think how much rum could have been made out of 2,300,000 gallons of molasses.

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"The game is afoot."

I thought the US postal sevice was privitzed. Oh, no, that's Federal Express.

Sorry, but it wont happen. With all respect to unions, the USPS is union. and as long as it is, they can't make money

Dang....newspapers. I remember those

After my parakeet died, I cancelled my subscription to the "Louisville Courier Journal" newspaper.

When he was still alive, I was amazed to discover that he could read as well as talk, as he would often squawk out things such as, "What kind of poop is this? Who gives a crap if the mayor has decided the city needs more park benches? Why do you keep littering the bottom of my birdcage with this eyewash?"

I somehow felt that reading the "Louisville Courier Journal" caused my parakeet's premature death, so I decided to drop the paper. You know what...? I now feel great and my health has improved greatly.

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"The game is afoot."

What should we look at when we consider how our country is doing on jobs? The media focuses on the unemployment rate. I don't think that is the way to look at it, because it is fraught with all sorts of shenanigans that don't tell the real story. I think that the right way to look at it is very simple, just report how many people have jobs, both in actual numbers and as a percentage. In my opinion, that tells the truth, and doesn't leave a whole lot of room for shenanigans.

Here are two charts that show the number and percentage of people employed in the United States that look back a number of years:





I don't think this way of looking at the employment situation in our country as political. I consider it the correct way to view how our country is really doing when it comes to jobs.

p.s. If anyone wants to turn this into a political thing, I will not respond to you. I am only interested in what you think about the best way to evaluate how we are doing on jobs.

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"The game is afoot."

Does anybody have any thoughts about the Pentagon's recent decision to place women in front line, infantry, combat positions? I do, but I thought I'd wait to see if anybody was interested in commenting on this.

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"The game is afoot."

I think most of you know that I spend a lot of time in Rome, NY, when I'm not in Louisville, KY. Yesterday, I went to the Jervis Library in Rome to apply for a Library card. There was a little woman behind the desk (Originally from South Korea), who was in charge that day. She asked me how she could help me, and I told her that I wanted to get a library card.

She smiled and asked to see my driver's license for proof of residency, so I gave her my Kentucky license, and immediately told her that I spent nearly half of my time in Rome, but when I wasn't here I lived in Louisville.

She looked at me sternly, and said, "The tax payers of Oneida County pay for this Library, and if you are not an Oneida County tax payer, you cannot have a library card."

Good for her...! (I agree with her. She is absolutely right.)

p.s. I wish we could get many more little women like her from South Korea to work the voting precincts across our country, and demand that voters show a valid driver's license, before they are handed a ballot and walk off to the voting booth, without anyone knowing who they really are, or where they're from.

p.p.s. Heck, if people don't need to have an I.D. to vote, why not let them have a library card too...?

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.................... Goodnight I'm going to bed, after I return this book I have in my left pocket to the library.

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"The game is afoot."

I looked for the thread "NTN is Wrong Again", but even though I know it is hiding somewhere on the "ScaRatings", I couldn't find it. It's too late, I'm too tired, and too lazy to try to find it tonight, so I will just post this here.

In the past week Buzztime trivia has told us the the largest desert is the Sahara twice. NO, it is NOT...! The largest desert on the planet Earth is Antarctica!

p.s. If anyone can find the "NTN is Wrong Again" thread, please let me know where it is. Thanks.

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"The game is afoot."

Okay, you are right. Antarctica is over 5 million squire miles and is mostly desert. The Sahara is around 3 million square miles. But most sources still cite the Sahara as the largest desert; it certainly is the largest "hot" desert. And if someone were to ask me in the future what the largest desert in the world is, without even thinking about it, I may well continue to say, "Sahara".

Look up "world's largest desert" in Google, and you wind the Wikipedia page for largest deserts of over 50,000 square kilometers. Antarctica is listed as #1, the Arctic (parts of North America, Asia, and Europe) is #2, and the Sahara is #3. This one I question as the Arctic covers discontiguous land areas, but it lists the Arctic as being barely behind Antarctica as the world's second-largest desert.

-- RWM

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"...It could not have evolved by chance. It proves you exist, and so therefore, by your own arguments, you don't. QED...."

Zog, you are a walking encyclopedia...

For kicks I'm gonna throw this trivia question out for you. Where will you find our solar system's largest desert? I haven't Googled the answer, but I have a good guess as to what the answer might be. The ball is your court, what do you think the answer is?

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"The game is afoot."

I've been called worse things.


My guesses would either be Venus or the Sun. I exclude the gas giants because I don't know if water precipitation could fall from their clouds, whereas the Sun wouldn't have rain or snow when it's 6000C and up. But let's narrow the definition a bit and exclude gaseous objects. Then the answer to your question is definitely Venus, even if sulfuric acid does rain from the clouds (it would evaporate before reaching the surface).

Just looked at the Wikipedia page for Desert after I posted the above. Wikipedia claims that Mars is the only other planet where deserts have been identified, a statement I find questionable. My answer is still Venus.

-- RWM

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"...It could not have evolved by chance. It proves you exist, and so therefore, by your own arguments, you don't. QED...."

ZOG, I don't think we will ever know the answer, but my guess was Mars. However, Venus is starting to worry me. It's bigger than Mars, and though Venus does have precipiation, it isn't water (or snow). Even though Mars has no precipitation, I think you are probably right. I might add that for a planet to have a desert, I would think it would have to have a solid surface. I excluded all of the gaseous planets for this reason.

p.s. You say you have been called worse than "A Walking Encyclopedia". How about this..? You are "A Walking World Almanac".

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"The game is afoot."

Actually, Mars does get precipitation. A few years ago, in 2008, the Phoenix lander observed snow falling from clouds; even thought the snow evaporated before hitting ground, it's still precipitation.

-- RWM

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"...It could not have evolved by chance. It proves you exist, and so therefore, by your own arguments, you don't. QED...."

ZOG, please remind me to never get into a debate with you, where facts count.

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"The game is afoot."

Not too long ago I cut my knuckle the night before I was flying to Upstate New York in the morning. I cleaned it and wrapped it up. The cut was fairly deep, and started bleeding again every time I moved the finger, so when my lady friend picked me up at the Syracuse airport the next day, I said that we should probably go to the VA hospital there to get some stitches. She said that she just wanted to get back to Rome, and it would be easier to go to the hospital there, and we did.

After waiting an hour or so to get it taken care of, the doctor told me that because it had been too long since I cut it, she was not permitted to stitch it up. They cleaned it again (which wasn't necessary), rewrapped it, gave me a tetanus shot, and said goodbye.

How much to you think the hospital's bill was...?

A- $13.50
B- $135.50
C- $1,352.50
D- $13,520.50

If you chose "C" you are right. However, any of you who chose "D", don't despair, I've got a feeling it won't be too many years before you will be right.

That's not all. I got a second bill for $412.00 from the doctor.

Add these two together, and it comes to $1,764.50 for basically just putting a fancy band-aid on a cut knuckle and giving me a tetanus shot.

Don't worry, I didn't have to pay this amount. After Medicare, the two of them only set me back $180.54, which is still way too much. Who paid the rest...? YOU DID...!

This is insane, something has to change. Please feel free to contact your representatives in congress and tell them this story. I will be more than happy to send you copies of the bills. (Not joking.)

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"The game is afoot."

Darn, Cloudy. And with that money, I was going to buy you some beer. I guess me paying your medical bills come first.

Ha Ha Ha.

Seriously, Medicare has ways of working with the doctors to lower the costs of medical bills. What you probably saw in the first bill was what people without insurance have to pay. Insurance works with doctors and hospitals to lower the expenses.

YODA, I'm not bitching about the $184.50, even though it was way too much. I'm upset that it would cost $1,764.50 to have a fancy band-aid put on a cut knuckle and getting a tetanus shot. That is outrageous, and nobody should have to cough up that much money for such a simple thing. The fact that Medicare or insurance companies pay for most of it is even worse, because it really comes from you, the taxpayers or medical insurance premiums that people pay.

The problem is that most people just look at what they have to pay out of pocket, and don't give a shit about the unbelievable, ridiculous, unjustifiable overcharges that hospitals get for treating them. The expenses are not lowered by Medicare or health insurance policies, they are passed on to others to pay.

I would rather die than ever go a hospital again, and subject everyone else to paying this exorbitant rip off for me.

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"The game is afoot."

It has come to my attention that a seven-year-old in Maryland actually chewed his Pop Tart into the shape of a gun. Can you believe that this kid got off with a slap on the wrist, and was only suspended from school for two days?

Here's a picture of the seven-year-old that the school in Maryland is protecting his classmates and the rest of society from:



p.s. If his parents are able to get that Pop Tart back from the District Attorney, they could probably auction it off on eBay for a pretty penny.

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"The game is afoot."

Wasn't that frozen carbon dioxide (dry ice)?

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"Truth Like Football. Gets kicked around much, before reaching goal." - Charlie Chan

" Don't look back, The bastards might be gaining on you." - Satchel Paige

Frank

About 15 years ago I had outpatient hernia repair surgery. I was in the hospital for 6 hours. Most of the time just laying in bed. The original hospital bill bill was $22,000,00. Blue Cross get it lowered to $14,000.00. For the life of me I can not fathom how it culd cost $22,000.00. I only paid about $100.00 thanks to insurance.

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"Truth Like Football. Gets kicked around much, before reaching goal." - Charlie Chan

" Don't look back, The bastards might be gaining on you." - Satchel Paige

Frank

Frank, Monday night I was playing trivia with four buddies, and I brought my cut knuckle story up between games. They all had similar stories. One of the guys there, FSHMAN, made a good point. He said the problem is that very few people ever look at their hospital bills, they just see that they owe a hundred bucks, and don't realise how inflated the bill was that their insurance or Medicare paid. The thing is that even if you or I get off relatively cheaply, somebody else is paying it. If more people stood up and complained about these outrageous medical charges, maybe something would change.

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"The game is afoot."

I spent yesterday, while waiting at the doctor's office, writing checks to various health organizations, doctors, nurses, home health care. I just picked up the first ten envelopes off the stack 30 or so deep (only had 10 stamps) and got to writing. I did pay attention to the bills and what was charged and covered. It looks like my insurance is covering most things at 80%. Some was a total coverage.

Most off the bills were in the $100-200 range, with some over $1000 and two under $25. Needless to say, I had a few stamps left over from the $1,000 payments. A payment plan will need to be set-up for those.

Of course, after seeing the doctor, another round of billing will be starting...EGADS!!!