A lovely analysis and opinion of US jobs ending up overseas, but days late for my snappy comeback to that guy I didn’t really feel like debating. The article also makes the unpopular points that
a. in a healthy economy there will still be unemployed people, usually around 5% and
b. the new jobs created as the labor market shifts will require people able to use and analyze information which requires some education and inclination, quite a lot more than was needed on the ole widget factory line.

As always, unpopular points lose out to shiny promises that can’t be met, especially in an election year.

When gigantic vehicles are all the rage, I want a tiny car! How about a Vespa? Or a Messerschmitt? I would feel like the girl from the future in this one. And a girl from Italy in this one.

Sick of knitting sweaters and hats? Knit yourself a rock video!

Are you a smelly hippie type who can’t shake the old blood-lust? Check out pasture raised meat in your area, with the added bonus that you can see if you and your pals can eat a whole pig.

Have you read Unshelved? You totally should. It’s even better than User Friendly, but I may have a professional bias.

Just in case you have to go, basic Icelandic phrases.

One can make a really cool alcohol stove out of pop and beer cans. But one can make stoves and ovens that look much less elegant and burn fuel that is easier to scrounge from all sorts of materials. The best ideas can be found in places of great necessity: areas that are usually or temporarily without a lot of infrastructure. Take a look at news photos of disaster areas, refugee camps, and the middle of nowhere. Human ingenuity wins over adversity almost every time.

Alyson Hannigan shows good taste in comic actors in an interviewette in Entertainment Weekly:
“Your favorite moments during filming [of American Wedding]?”
“Working with Eugene Levy and Fred Willard, I was in hog heaven. I threatened to kidnap them and put them in my basement and make them teach me everything they know.”

Truckers ignore traffic advisories, claim ignorance.
“Barry Brecto, a Federal Highway Administration bridge engineer based in Olympia, said he found it ‘hard to believe’ that truck drivers didn’t know the height of their loads.

“‘Drivers are licensed and subject to drug tests and regular inspections. I don’t know why some truck drivers are not obtaining proper permits for their loads and following the law,’ he said. ”

On an unrelated note, from the book Colonial American English: Words and Phrases Found in Colonial Writing, Now Archaic, Obscure, Obsolete, or Whose Meanings Have Changed:
“hippocras (n.) A wine with cloves, ginger, cinnamon, and nutmeg added. From latin vinum Hippocraticum ‘wine of Hippocrates,’ as it was filtered through a flannel hippocrates bag.”

Unfortunately, hippocrates bag is not defined. But Brewer’s Dictionary of Phrase and Fable comes to the rescue:
“Hippocrates’ sleeve. A woolen bag of a square piece of flannel, having the opposite corners joined, so as to make it triangular. It was used by apothecaries for straining syrups, decoctions and the like and formerly by vintners.”

Top ten toxic substances listed in ToxFaq that could be good female first names, possibly good gaming names.
10. Ethion
9. Toluene
8. Toxaphene (“Toxie” for short)
7. Beryllium
6. Cadmium
5. Phosgene/Phosphine (tie)
4. Mirex
3. Endrin
2. Dichlorvos
(drumroll)
1. Antimony