Random Thoughts That Don't Deserve Their Own Thread Go Here

[HerRealName]

After years of commercials, I just realized for the first time last night that the 'Limu' in 'Limu Emu' is short for Liberty Mutual. It was a depressing realization of my lack of intelligence.

[akoleander]

Originally Posted by Edward64

Sorry for being a Debbie Downer but below pics made me tear up some. I think it was "The Pitt" that had an episode depicting similar.

Family tearfully sends-off teen killed by drunk illegal immigrant before his organs donated

I am an organ donor (but not research or med school please!). Just make sure I'm really dead first; told wife to pull plug after a short period of time. Definitely, a worthwhile legacy

My wife's 20 year old cousin passed away from some kind of heart conditon earlier this year. He was an organ donor and they did something like this also. It was rough.

[NobodyHere]

Originally Posted by HerRealName

After years of commercials, I just realized for the first time last night that the 'Limu' in 'Limu Emu' is short for Liberty Mutual. It was a depressing realization of my lack of intelligence.

Well son of a gun...

[Ghost Econ]

Wanna blow your mind more... Doug in those commercials is just a portmanteau of Dork and Ugly.

[Ghost Econ]

https://swimply.com
This seems like a great way to murder your homeowners insurance.

[Lathum]

yeah. We have a 40,000 gallon pool with a diving board and a slide. Zero chance I would do this.

[GrantDawg]

We have really been considering do that. Just me and the wife for a couple of hours. No one to bother us, just float and relax. I went to a friends house and swam in his pool a couple of weekends. It was the first time I had been in a pool in probably ten years.

[GrantDawg]

Underage kids are going to start buying up Celsius like mad, trying to play alcohol lottery.


https://www.nbcnews.com/business/bus...hol-rcna222005

[Passacaglia]

Has anyone used Thrive Market? My mom gifted me a subscription for Hanukkah and I'm just getting around to using it. It's look like it's a $60 per year membership, just so I can get access to stuff that's also overpriced? I'm trying to figure out what I can buy that would make this worth it.

[JonInMiddleGA]

Originally Posted by Passacaglia

Has anyone used Thrive Market? My mom gifted me a subscription for Hanukkah and I'm just getting around to using it. It's look like it's a $60 per year membership, just so I can get access to stuff that's also overpriced? I'm trying to figure out what I can buy that would make this worth it.

I randomly googled the subject since I'd never heard of Thrive until this post.

Based on some message board reading, it's only reasonably competitive categories are baby products (food, wipes, etc) and name brand packaged/convenience organic foods. Most posters commented about how Costco and even Target were often cheaper on many items in all other categories and within 10% or so on just about anything.

In the same apparent niche some expressed a preference for something called Azure(?), which apparently has better selection & pricing on things like produce

[flere-imsaho]

Originally Posted by Lathum

Fucking horrible, the little sister ( I presume) guts me. Probably because my kids are similar ages and her world would be wrecked.

The college-aged daughter of a co-worker was killed by a drunk driver (also an illegal immigrant) in a hit-and-run earlier this summer. Last year a HS kid in our town was killed when his car was hit by a 21-year-old doing 140+ in a 35 mph zone late at night with his lights off.

[GrantDawg]

The whole Sydeny Sweeney-Amercan Eagle jeans ad thing seems overblown, but there have been some good jokes about it. My favorite:
"I was laughing the whole thing off, but news has just come down the wire that Sydney Sweeney has invaded Poland."

Sent from my SM-S938U using Tapatalk

[Edward64]

Originally Posted by GrantDawg

The whole Sydeny Sweeney-Amercan Eagle jeans ad thing seems overblown, but there have been some good jokes about it. My favorite:
"I was laughing the whole thing off, but news has just come down the wire that Sydney Sweeney has invaded Poland."

Yeah, I don't get it either. If it comes out that she's attended a nazi party rally, then different thing. But right now, just seems to be an overreaction. And shouldn't the blame be on American Eagle?

But heck, American Eagle should come out with a series of them. Sex/sensuality + attractive people sells, so maybe they should have started with Zoe Saldana/Sofia Vergara first.

[cuervo72]

Originally Posted by GrantDawg

The whole Sydeny Sweeney-Amercan Eagle jeans ad thing seems overblown, but there have been some good jokes about it. My favorite:
"I was laughing the whole thing off, but news has just come down the wire that Sydney Sweeney has invaded Poland."

Sent from my SM-S938U using Tapatalk

Fox News making a thing out of something that wasn’t really a thing outside of a handful of people on TikTok, basically. Their usual manufactured outrage at something “the left” is not really doing.

(My reaction was basically “Jeans? Selling the wrong article of clothing, I think.”)

[QuikSand]

So, I think I want to coin a new term.

There's a member of my household, to whom I am related by marriage, who has picked up a habit. We are, mostly by her hand, what you might call super-users of our county library. We typically have 10-20 books in the house for our kids... probably waning a bit as they have aged out, but it's been a thing for some time.

But we also, at any given time, have probably 10-20 other books suited to her own tastes. Books on health, nutrition, and cooking... but then into geography or politics, and then some into any number of areas that seem interesting or timely. And those books will, very reliably, sit in a pile in a certain location of our kitchen/dining area, for 2-4 weeks, and then be returned to the library, untouched.

I presume that there's some sort of aspirational spirit here that she is reluctant to give up. That at least she has the opportunity to read these positive and/or important things once they are in our home. But the end result is, it seems, that some faceless database has an impressive record of her many years of checkouts, and that these tomes sit in our homes for no better purpose than osmosis. What is that? Is there a word for it? Could there be?

-phile or -philia
libro- or text- or book-
something about virtue or hope in there

Anyway, drop by sometime if you want to learn about the value of vitamin B-12 or the six day war, and have like 11 hours to sit down and read a book about it. We'll make you some hummus and tea.

[cuervo72]

Tsundoku - Wikipedia

(Learned about that here, though that's a paid post so you may not be able to see the question on it. I am guilty of this; while I do read, I buy way more books than I can possibly get to.)

[Atocep]

Originally Posted by cuervo72

Tsundoku - Wikipedia

I do this with my Steam account.

[flere-imsaho]

Originally Posted by Atocep

I do this with my Steam account.

Who doesn't?

If I could, I would build a new house with a massive library / study just for myself, and there would be a lot of books in there "that I'll read someday".

[flere-imsaho]

Well, it finally happened. The dog got sick and the robot vacuum (which, ironically, we mainly got for the dog fur) gleefully spread it around the living room before we could stop it.

The dog has had meds and is much better now, though, thanks for asking.

The robot vacuum is a write-off.

[Atocep]

Originally Posted by flere-imsaho

Well, it finally happened. The dog got sick and the robot vacuum (which, ironically, we mainly got for the dog fur) gleefully spread it around the living room before we could stop it.

The dog has had meds and is much better now, though, thanks for asking.

The robot vacuum is a write-off.

We have robot vacuums/mops on all 3 floors and I swear by them, but this is my nightmare.

Fwiw we prefer roborock over the other models we've had.

[cuervo72]

That's kind of my goal with the basement, though we have so much crap we need to get rid of so it's never realistically going to happen. But I have repurposed some of the kids entertainment/storage (essentially a JC Penny knockoff of Pottery Barn's "Cameron" system; three pullouts on the bottom, then one unit with doors and four of the "cubbies", which can go two rows deep of most books). But even in those there's a bunch of Wii games and accessories and random toy stuff.

[Ghost Econ]

Playing football manager and sold my club's all time leading scorer who I plucked from the lower division. He was 33 and still a goal machine, but I had a couple younger guys ready to take over.

Normally this would be a non-story, except as soon as the transfer went through, All By Myself by Eric Carmen started playing on my phone.

[sovereignstar v2]

Would be nice if my company/dept could get through a single year without layoffs. A couple of positions were eliminated this morning, including my boss's. Always a fucking gut punch because when it hits so close to home.

[GrantDawg]

Having a meeting today that might determine the rest of my life. I am being pitched going into business with one of my co-workers, and it is very tempting. It comes with some big risks that I am going to have to feel more comfortable with before making the jump. Still, this is probably the best opportunity that will ever have to be an owner and not a worker drone.

[flere-imsaho]

Originally Posted by Ghost Econ

Playing football manager

I'm still playing my FM21 Touch dynasty, currently in 2098. The plan was do journeyman by picking a newly-promoted in each country's lowest league and before I could move on, I had to a) win that country's highest league and b) become a club legend.

The plan was to finish in England, so I ended up going through the top 6 leagues like so: Italy, Spain, Portugal, France, Germany, England.

Italy: Virtus Verona. 3 straight promotions. 8 years to complete. Had to win Serie A twice before I became a legend. After I left an oligarch bought and owned the club for maybe 20 years, and all that investment made them into one of the world's top 5 clubs, and they've stayed there ever since.

Spain: Alfaro. Took me 5 years to get to Liga A and 13 years overall to complete, mostly because I was screwing around with tactics. Won the Spanish Cup twice before winning Liga A. Alfaro has probably done the least well since my departure. They stayed in Liga A for about 30 years before turning into a club that bounced back and forth ever since. I think year I won the league was a lucky down year for both Real Madrid & Barcelona.

Portugal: 1st Dezembro. Easy. 3 straight promotions, won Euro Cup 2 2 years into Primera Liga, won Primera Liga 5 years after promotion. Porto, Sporting, and Benfica are a challenge to break into, but much less so than Barca & Madrid in Spain. They've not been relegated since I left, but have mainly stayed outside the top 3.

France: JA Drancy. Took a year and then two straight promotions. Nine years overall to success, which also included the Euro Cup in my final year. Not too difficult, though you spend many years beating your head against PSG. Since I left they've mainly been a mid-table team, with only one year relegated in the midst of all that.

Germany: Meppen. Eight years total, with two consecutive promotions right off the bat. Had to win the Bundesliga twice to get legend status. By this time my understanding of player recruitment was very good, and I generally took advantage of Min Release clauses a lot, so it felt pretty inevitable after the first two promotions. Meppen have remained an upper-mid-table side since my departure and I see them a fair bit in Europe.

England: Carshalton. Picked this as an old, old club from the southern suburbs of London, hoping it would eventually get me good gates (it has). Like usual in England, a bit of a slog. Took 3 years to get promoted out of VNS, then got relegated right back. Then took 4 years to get promoted out of the VNL. However, once I entered League Two, it was all consecutive promotions to EPL. Then took six years to win EPL, seven to win UCL. I'll add that the first two seasons were pretty touch-and-go with relegation, but once some of my young high-risk / high-potential buys started to mature, it got pretty safe.

At this point I've managed Carshalton for 30 years and have:

• 5 UCL
• 10 EPL (10 straight, going on 11, as it happens)
• 1 Club World Championship
• 6 FA Cup
• 1 Euro Cup
• 3 Euro Super Cups
• 5 League Cup
• 7 Community Shield

At this point most matches are pretty easy, but I still am finding a lot of fun scouting, signing, and developing talent. I generally try to identify young talent around the world under 19 and get them signed before other big clubs sign them, and then generally let my top folks go for huge fees when they're 26-29.

Arsenal, MU, MC, Chelsea, Liverpool, and Tottenham are all still the Big 6, though each has the occasional run of duff years. Sheffield Wednesday has also had an oligarch owner for ages, so they're usually among the mix as well and routinely offer stupid money for my players, which is entertaining. Outside of those only Everton & Leicester have had runs of top-3 excellence. Man Utd had a huge run of success under Ole and ended up with 45 EPL titles before I came on the scene. Theoretically that's my goal, but that's at least 35 more seasons....

Anyway, AMA.

[Edward64]

Originally Posted by GrantDawg

Having a meeting today that might determine the rest of my life. I am being pitched going into business with one of my co-workers, and it is very tempting. It comes with some big risks that I am going to have to feel more comfortable with before making the jump. Still, this is probably the best opportunity that will ever have to be an owner and not a worker drone.

I had a small company & other partners (before I joined big business). Take it FWIW, there's more but below is top of mind.

• His and your role & responsibilities. Since he is bringing you in, assume you'll be < 50% partner, like 80-20. Know what he expects of you. Who will do marketing; take care of website; be in charge of taxes & returns; handle payroll etc. in addition to regular work
• How profit sharing will work. If your taxes say profit of $50k, the split could be 80-20 but you guys may disagree if you'll distribute $50k or just $20k and put rest back into company
• What are your financial liabilities? Are you expected to put up some equity (e.g. your home as part of any bank loan) or some sort of buy-in $ to kick off the company?
• Do you like & trust the guy enough? Does he seem to have good leadership/management/communication/marketing etc. skills?
• Is there really a plan to be successful? Spend alot of time here and talk about "how" the company will be successful

Good luck !!

(... and oh, when time comes, put everything down on paper so there is no misunderstanding)

[bhlloy]

This could probably go in the Sports Media thread we have somewhere, but I googled Zach Wilson because I wasn't sure that was him playing for the Dolphins, and the first article in the news section was what appeared to be a totally fabricated "article" from a sports site that talked about how he'd rallied the team in the game on Friday against the Bears after Tua threw two interceptions and now had the locker room fully behind him moving forward. Dated August 8th 2025.

I have no idea what happened there, from a glitch in the matrix to finding a parody or fanfic site being passed off as legit news to AI garbage slop that has learned how to optimize for the feeds that Google uses but my money is on the latter, and my guess is it's only going to continue to get worse.

On a somewhat related topic, if you want to see something completely insane, go look at the ChatGPT reddit or social media in general after GPT 5 was released and they turned access to the old models off. People genuinely losing their shit up to and including threats of self harm because they'd lost their partner/baby/companion. We are so fucked.

[miami_fan]

Originally Posted by GrantDawg

Having a meeting today that might determine the rest of my life. I am being pitched going into business with one of my co-workers, and it is very tempting. It comes with some big risks that I am going to have to feel more comfortable with before making the jump. Still, this is probably the best opportunity that will ever have to be an owner and not a worker drone.

I concur with everything Edward wrote. Yep I actually typed that.

Seriously, I would add to the last line of advice "what" does a successful company look like and do both of you agree on that "what". Success for one partner may be having the best X company in your county while the other may only see success if the company is competing dollar for dollar with Apple.

[flere-imsaho]

Yes, Edward's post is good advice. I'd also ask what the exit strategy looks like, especially if you're going to have some sort of stake/equity.

[miami_fan]

Originally Posted by bhlloy

This could probably go in the Sports Media thread we have somewhere, but I googled Zach Wilson because I wasn't sure that was him playing for the Dolphins, and the first article in the news section was what appeared to be a totally fabricated "article" from a sports site that talked about how he'd rallied the team in the game on Friday against the Bears after Tua threw two interceptions and now had the locker room fully behind him moving forward. Dated August 8th 2025.

I have no idea what happened there, from a glitch in the matrix to finding a parody or fanfic site being passed off as legit news to AI garbage slop that has learned how to optimize for the feeds that Google uses but my money is on the latter, and my guess is it's only going to continue to get worse.

I can't say I have seen them written before the event has actually occurred but yeah you will definitely see AI "articles" like that. Also it is not limited to sports media either. A girl who went to the local high school passed away in a car accident and some of the AI articles that popped up before the official reporting hit the local news sites were deplorable.

[sovereignstar v2]

You have little more than a month to use up those free minutes you have

[Ghost Econ]

Someone drove a car into the Lululemon store downtown this morning in order to rob it.

I have to imagine every white teenage girl in the city is gonna take a crying selfie in front of it like they're that native american in that 70s garbage commercial.

[dubb93]

Originally Posted by Ghost Econ

Someone drove a car into the Lululemon store downtown this morning in order to rob it.

I have to imagine every white teenage girl in the city is gonna take a crying selfie in front of it like they're that native american in that 70s garbage commercial.

Fun fact you may not know. He wasn’t actually a Native American. He was Italian. His entire career was a lie.

[Honolulu_Blue]

Originally Posted by Ghost Econ

Someone drove a car into the Lululemon store downtown this morning in order to rob it.

I have to imagine every white teenage girl in the city is gonna take a crying selfie in front of it like they're that native american in that 70s garbage commercial.

Also, there is no way that teenage girls would ever cry that stoically, especially for a selfie.

That driving a car into a store to rob it seems like a bold strategy. I wonder if it paid off...

[Ghost Econ]

It did not. No merchandise was stolen, but there are signs they were trying to find the registers to steal them.

Which begs the question, who is paying cash at Lululemon? Even assuming they for some reason left cash in the registers overnight, I can't imagine there's more in there than $3.50.

I have to assume this was meant to mimic the psych episode where the thiefs would break in and not steal anything but would make copies of credit card applications.


Edit: now the news is saying $4600 in merchandise was stolen... So about 3 pairs of pants.

[Lathum]

I get it is a Sunday morning, but ESPN2 is showing the All Star Air Guitar competition with full on announcing and color commentary.

[GrantDawg]

Originally Posted by Edward64

I had a small company & other partners (before I joined big business). Take it FWIW, there's more but below is top of mind.

• His and your role & responsibilities. Since he is bringing you in, assume you'll be < 50% partner, like 80-20. Know what he expects of you. Who will do marketing; take care of website; be in charge of taxes & returns; handle payroll etc. in addition to regular work
• How profit sharing will work. If your taxes say profit of $50k, the split could be 80-20 but you guys may disagree if you'll distribute $50k or just $20k and put rest back into company
• What are your financial liabilities? Are you expected to put up some equity (e.g. your home as part of any bank loan) or some sort of buy-in $ to kick off the company?
• Do you like & trust the guy enough? Does he seem to have good leadership/management/communication/marketing etc. skills?
• Is there really a plan to be successful? Spend alot of time here and talk about "how" the company will be successful

Good luck !!

(... and oh, when time comes, put everything down on paper so there is no misunderstanding)

Originally Posted by miami_fan

I concur with everything Edward wrote. Yep I actually typed that.

Seriously, I would add to the last line of advice "what" does a successful company look like and do both of you agree on that "what". Success for one partner may be having the best X company in your county while the other may only see success if the company is competing dollar for dollar with Apple.

Originally Posted by flere-imsaho

Yes, Edward's post is good advice. I'd also ask what the exit strategy looks like, especially if you're going to have some sort of stake/equity.

Thanks for the advise on this. Much of it was where I already was, but it is good to see I was on the right page. We had another meeting today with a third partner. We have roles divided up (One is sales, I am service, the other is admin). We seem to agree on goals, pricing, and service, which is basically how our previous company ran before it was sold. The new company has come in jacking up rates and pissing off customers left and right, and is giving us an easy opening. More, we have no non-compete, not they are very binding in a right to work state, but we don't even have that much holding us back. We are just doing our due diligence now on realistically how much we need in running capital and how much revenue we can expect on ramp up. It is far from a done deal yet, but every day brings it closer to reality. We are probably going to have to move soon, or we are going to lose clients to other businesses.

[NobodyHere]

How exactly is golf an entertaining sport on TV?

[JonInMiddleGA]

Originally Posted by GrantDawg

We are just doing our due diligence now on realistically how much we need in running capital and how much revenue we can expect on ramp up.

This feels like a specific point that I'm somewhat qualified to comment on, so I'm going to.

Once upon a time, what feels like a lifetime ago, we (me+wife) spun off on our own and opened our own agency. Circumstances of that had several similarities to how you describe your current situation.

When we pulled the trigger on the move officially, we had a firm commitment from one existing (substantial) client that they would go with us. (What we could do better was exactly what they wanted most basically). It was not in writing, but we had considerable trust in the person making the commitment.
And it worked out as designed, for both sides, for the better part of a decade from their (and only went askew when they themselves were acquired by another company)

MY advice - having kinda been there, done that - is that you pull the trigger if you have at least one commitment you're willing to bet your life/livelihood on.
(or however many you need to make the initial math to work)

That first for-real client is the most important one you'll ever have, because it makes every client that follows exponentially easier to get.

And look, even if it's written in blood, these days there's probably nothing that's truly 100.00% "certain" ... but I'd you have the necessary number (however many that is) to survive at least the first 6-12 months in a state that's "literally as sure as anything can possibly be".

Hopefully that makes sense, I tried best I could anyhow.

[GrantDawg]

No, it does make sense, but in our business it takes many. We have a life's blood in our pocket, which are a number of real estate agents and property managers. The new company is doubling and trippling rates on them, and we already had great relationships with them. We also have a large number of regular customers that aren't happy with the family owned business turning big corporate. We pretty comfortably have a book of clients. It will just come down actual numbers. We will need to ramp up to 150-200 regular customers in a few months, which sounds like a lot but really isn't. (Just as example, I service 200-220 a month right now, I'm talking about 100 a month for this). We should be looking at some big ticket jobs pretty regularly as well. The problem is we can only get verbal commitments from very few people we absolutely trust right now. A wiff we are moving on, and we will be out the door.

Sent from my SM-S938U using Tapatalk

[Edward64]

Sounds exciting. Keep us posted on what you decide

[Atocep]

Two tickets I had to send people to resolve today.

First one, computer wouldn't turn on. It was unplugged.

Second one, the person somehow managed to delete their recycle bin and wanted that plus the files that were in it restored.

[Ghost Econ]

Hearing a parent describe their son's experience at Hell week at The Citadel just makes it seem like the dumbest cult imaginable. What is the possible purpose of making a person sit in an uncomfortable chair crosslegged while holding your shoes in your hands outstretched while someone yells at you.

That's not discipline, it's making you subservient to a sadistic loser.

[QuikSand]

Originally Posted by dubb93

Fun fact you may not know. He wasn’t actually a Native American. He was Italian. His entire career was a lie.

So was the ad campaign, a cynical move by the packaging industry to shift blame for litter onto us, rather than them.

[Kodos]

Much like beverage companies trying to blame consumers for not recycling enough.

[Lathum]

For those of you who live near WaWa I feel like them expanding their menu has come at a cost of speed. You used to be able to order, grab a drink and chips, go pay, and your sandwich was ready. Now it is at least a 10 minute wait every time.

Yes I know I can order through the app but that isn't really my style.

[RainMaker]

Is anyone else's neighborhood inundated with those electric bikes that kids are riding around? Not to sound too old man yelling at clouds but it seems pretty dangerous. Those things going down sidewalks at 25 MPH feels like a disaster waiting to happen.

[Lathum]

Originally Posted by RainMaker

Is anyone else's neighborhood inundated with those electric bikes that kids are riding around? Not to sound too old man yelling at clouds but it seems pretty dangerous. Those things going down sidewalks at 25 MPH feels like a disaster waiting to happen.

I live in a shore town and it is terrible. They are an absolute menace and the kids don't even remotely try and follow the rules. I almost killed a kid a short while ago.

It's just a matter of time before someone gets killed. There needs to be heavy regulations for sure.

The parents that buy these for their kids also need their heads examined. I saw a girl with one outside Taco Bell today and she couldn't have be older than 10.

[RainMaker]

It's crazy too because most of these kids aren't wearing helmets and are riding directly in traffic. Saw a kid who couldn't be older than 12 doing wheelies on a street that is like 40 MPH. Then there is just getting run over on a sidewalk by one and probably breaking half the bones in my body.

[JonInMiddleGA]

Originally Posted by RainMaker

It's crazy too because most of these kids aren't wearing helmets and are riding directly in traffic. Saw a kid who couldn't be older than 12 doing wheelies on a street that is like 40 MPH. Then there is just getting run over on a sidewalk by one and probably breaking half the bones in my body.

Definitely a state law area. Helmets required by law in Georgia for riders (regular or e-bike) under 16. Bicycles prohibited on sidewalks for riders over age 12, except where reversed by local ordinance (city of Atlanta is actually one locale that reversed this)

In Florida, Will just had a case that began with a traffic stop for a e-bike on the highway without the required lights ... but their lighting rules & Georgia lighting rules are different.