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choripan

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Posts posted by choripan

  1. On 5/21/2024 at 10:12 AM, gernblansten said:

    Zingerman's pastrami reuben seemed a bit light on the meat for $22. Blimpy Burger has tiny patties with seemingly a quarter of a slice of cheese on it. I think you need three to five patties to make a substantial burger. My recollection is a single patty is around the size that'd fit on a King's Hawaiin slider roll. Onion rings were good. Beer Grotto is enjoyable. The law library is impressive. 

    Yeah, the standard burger at Blimpy's is a triple. I think they're 1/10 of a pound per patty and an adult can't even order a single patty (?). Never seen it over the course of going there 50-100 times. Anyway, back to business.

    Main Street Proper

    North Main Street (Culantro/Heidelberg/Chapala) – There’s a really good block of fairly priced restaurants on the north side of downtown. Culantro is good Peruvian cuisine and could hang with what I’ve had in Lima and Arequipa. Check what’s going on at Heidelberg. It’s a wood-paneled, German-themed, multi-level venue that sometimes has DJs, latin night, trivia, all sorts of stuff. And yes, of course, they have the boot. And the best for last, Chapala! One of my favorite places in the city, though I rarely eat there. The food is Tex-Mexy rather than Mexican, but the crowd at the bar is almost always down to chat, they’re always playing a good mix of rancheras and reggaeton, and they have a STRONG pour.

    Regents Field – The best sports bar in A2, imo. The food is actually good, you can get a pitcher for under $12-15, depending on what you order, and they have stuff like skee-ball and video games for free. Also, very importantly, they play the broadcast sound for games. 90% chance you’ll catch me watching a game here if I’m not at home or at the game.

    Pretzel Bell – An A2 classic and I don’t know why. The main floor is kinda lame, but the basement turns into a club at night. Listed here because of two things: (i) on weekend nights, they have a great DJ that plays a mix of 2000s and some 90s hip hop, mixed with modern stuff, and (ii) they fashioned an old can vending machine into the “Mystery Machine” where they stock cheap cans of beer and you can get them for $2. I’ve had MGD, Rolling Rock(!), Tecate, and a whole bunch of other random beers out of it.

    Conor O’Neils – A good Irish pub. They also often play sound for games.

    Blue Llama – A jazz bar that has good acts and an EXCELLENT chef, and usually the best menu in town, IMO. If you’re looking at a date night, this is my top rec.

    Cannelle – A patisserie/bakery that is a small chain, with 3 locations (Detroit, Ann Arbor, some random Detroit suburb). 90% sure it won a James Beard and their shit is top notch. This is the type of place I watch my wife eat an overpriced variation of a croissant with a pretentious mane while I sip my coffee.

    Lo-Fi – Poke your head in and see if you like the music. They have DJs that play anything from hip-hop to techno/EDM to reggaeton, depending on the night. Always busy on a weekend night and if you dig the music they have that night, you’ll have a good time.

  2. General -From like April/May until October/November, when the weather is nice, Ann Arbor pedestrianizes a bunch of its downtown streets and, more importantly, many places have go-cups. Just ask because some places participate in the go-cup program and some don’t. Either way, I recommended a stroll around downtown above, and it’s worth it. None of these places are more than a 10-15 minute walk apart, and after a vibe check on yourself or your group, head to whichever sounds best. All of these are usually a good time. There are also lots of “New American” bar/food type places but, fuck it, they’re ubiquitous in any urban or mostly urban environment.

    For the purposes of this, I'll divide Ann Arbor in West Downtown, Main Street, and East Downtown/Campus-ish. Here’s a map with West Downtown circled in red, Main Street circled in blue, and the remainder in green, and within that green with East Downtown X’ed in at the top, South University in the middle, and an outlying area off Packard street at the bottom. Very Generally, West Downtown is more of a 25-45 crowd, Main Street is 35+, and once you head east, except for in a few establishments, it's mostly under 30 and in many cases only students and some grad students. Game weekends, though, pretty much anywhere is fair game for anyone. 

    image.thumb.png.fc2eda5609980b610ee36875954f5994.png

    Also, don’t forget that recreational weed is legal in Michigan and the County Prosecutor does not prosecute for weed or shrooms (https://www.mlive.com/news/ann-arbor/2021/01/washtenaw-prosecutor-wont-charge-people-for-marijuana-shrooms-other-psychedelics.html).

    ** I'll do West Downtown tonight and get to the rest later **

    West Downtown – This is basically anything west of Main Street but not on Main Street. Here’s a bunch of places I like, depending on the general vibe of the group.

    • Babs' Underground - This is a cocktail spot where you'll typically see anything from grad students to 40-somethings. Most of the time, they'll be playing a great 90s-2000s hip-hop playlist, but more as background and not crunk. It's not a dancing place. Think stuff like Tribe Called Quest, Slum Village, etc.
    • 8 Ball Saloon - This was the place to get a ($6, then $7, then) $8 pitcher of Natty Light. Long-time basement bar with punk vibes. Some students found it between when I went to undergrad (2004) and now, so now I'd say it went from a place to get away from the uppity east coasters that are at UM to a place with a good mix of townies and gownies. Has one of those digital jukeboxes these days and the mix of people makes for a wild playlist. My fav thing here is to play (real, not plastic) darts, bullshit with my friends over cheap beer, and people watch.
    • Blind Pig - 8 Ball is the basement of the Pig. Check who is playing here because they have some great acts and a really deep history, though the venue is kind of unremarkable. A bit on the history: https://blindpigmusic.com/history/.
    • Circ - Mix of people like Babs' but the demo is more 21-30 years old. They have a huge dance floor area, an outdoor area with firepits, and a small roofdeck. Depending on who is there, the music, and whether it's karaoke night or DJ night, Circ will be either like a 2/10 or a 8+/10. Worth a peek if you're bopping around downtown.
    • Bill’s Beer Garden – Some time ago, the owners of A2 Home and Garden turned their parking lot into a biergarten at like 5-6pm each night.
    • Beer Grotto - Craft beer joint with indoor/outdoor seating, located on a corner. They always have a really good beer list, service is quick, and they let you bring in outside food. This is really clutch with the aforementioned Blimpy Burger, a great 24-hr diner (Fleetwood), and a BiBimBop place all right across the street.
    • Peridot/Pacific Rim – Creative east Asian cuisine. Pacific Rim is a bit more subdued and Peridot is a bit more creative. Peridot is a collaboration between the Pacific Rim chef and the owners of the next place on the list, and is a bit more creative.
    • Last Word – Named after the famous Detroit cocktail, if you’re a cocktail person this is the typical “best place to get a cocktail with a vaguely speakeasy vibe” that’s just about everywhere. Good pours, good drinks.
    • Blank Slate Creamery – This is a fancy ice cream joint where they’re creative with the flavors and all that jazz. I’m not a sweets guy, so don’t like that much ice cream, but they do a great four mini-scoop flight that’s perfect for sharing or each person having a mini-scoop or two individually.

     

     

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  3. 1 minute ago, immamac said:

    VW and Mercedes not being mentioned by convenience of US based is nice. They are doing really really good work. 

    I agree completely. MB getting level 3 actually on the streets and available to consumers for personal vehicles (contrasted with robo-taxis) is great work.

    I limited the scope to US because it's not something I feel confident enough to speak on with authority. My understanding is that MB would be with or a tiny gap behind GM/Cruise, but I don't want to get "gotcha'd" down thread if I'm off because I overstepped my knowledge on it.

  4. 1 hour ago, Guadaloopy said:

     

     

    Yes, FSD failed this particular test.  It's actually a very difficult test.  It doesn't take a very critical eye to watch this and see that the test was engineered to result in failure. 

    - The dummy was dressed in neutral colors and earth tones to blend in with the background vehicle and background vegetation and wall. 

    - The dummy remained stationary until very late in the test.

    - The dummy was accelerated to a near instantaneous running speed at the last possible moment.

    These conditions would be difficult for an unsuspecting human driver.

     

    O'Dowd is a disingenuous and untrustworthy Tesla FSD critic.  He is a competitor, and he is not above manipulating and falsifying experiments to show the results that support his arguments. Previous videos from O'Dowd have showed a warning on the Tesla screen indicating that the accelerator is being pressed by the human operator to override FSD's automated actions.  O'Dowd has passed these off as FSD failures when the failure is actually due to the overriding actions by the human operator. 

    This particular video has a warning on the screen that appears to be unrelated to FSD, but if multiple warnings are active, you can cycle through them to see the one you want.  There is something weird happening in this test.  In the first three tests, you can see the vehicle start to decelerate as it approaches the crosswalk and sees something, but it doesn't stop.  That leads me to believe that O'Dowd and his team are gaming the warning displays and actually slightly pressing the accelerator during these tests, effectively overriding FSD's automated actions.  I would like to see this test completed on a vehicle with no visible warnings on the screen.    

    I would also like to see videos from O'Dowd with the technology he supports passing this same test.

    Good example of why no system that only uses cameras can be safe, or why Tesla is getting lapped and is stuck at Level 2.

    With a proper system and sensor fusion, you would have caught the kid in time. Radar? Nope, not metallic enough. Cameras? Nope, obviously. LIDAR? Yep!

    That's why you need all three. They serve different roles to fill gaps in the capabilities of the others.

     

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  5. 6 hours ago, Fudge Nuggets said:

    If you're leasing your car, you probably have bigger financial black flags than some corporate rebate / discount.

    Lot of cases, especially relating to tax treatment, where a lease makes sense. Especially for business owners.

    In our personal case a few months ago, we leased a PHEV Jeep Wrangler in order to get the full $7500 EV credit, and then bought it out as soon as we could get a payoff from the leasing company. That's thousands of dollars in our pocket thanks to leasing 

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  6. 38 minutes ago, royiv said:

    No love for the Caddy that zigs? 

    I mean, the Catera led to the Alpha-platform cars (CTS-V and ATS-V, and now CT4/CT5), which are one of the few cars you can meaningfully track and put four people in that doesn't cost an arm and a leg.

    I hate Musk as much as the next guy, by the way. I'd also add that I'm anti-proprietary just-about-anything, and the closed-off charging network drove me berserk, not unlike Apple's lightning cord or the way they used to do iTunes songs...

    But ... I don't think I agree with the dominant sentiment here that going further down- and mass-market beyond the Model 3 is the play. I follow the auto industry at a distance, and there's a reason that many companies have dropped sedans and cheap cars -- they just don't make enough money per unit of capacity. And while I get the argument about cheap cars bringing customers to a brand for their future loyalty, the data don't indicate that customers are loyal enough to make it worth it and I don't think it's enough to offset making thousands than hundreds per car sold. I think the play for Tesla is not diluting the bread-and-butter of the brand too much by going downmarket, and refreshing their current vehicles.

    But at the end of the day, I think Tesla is a one-trick pony (very-arguably cool tech, big promises, cachet, and fast acceleration set against shoddy build and poor per-dollar performance in anything but a straight line) and others are catching up to their trick while they have no ability to create something "new" again.

  7. On the reliability issue, it's important to distinguish between issues that don't matter hugely and are easily fixed, like infotainment glitches, and serious issues, like steering wheels falling off or murderous and falsely-advertised full-self driving systems.

    Point being, IIRC Consumer Reports does not distinguish based on severity (infotainment vs. drivetrain, for example) when measuring incidents/reliability. May be JD power, though?

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  8. 1 minute ago, Guadaloopy said:

    No... the logic is that all of those things I listed are much more common concerns on the road than another driver using FSD.  There are only 400,000 cars in all of North America that have FSD.  Your likelihood of being on the road with a Tesla driver using FSD is pretty damn low.

    It's analogous to being overly concerned about sharks at the beach while not caring much about rip currents.

    I prefer to worry about rip currents, sharks, and (lately) especially orcas.

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  9. For a real ass-puckering bridge adventure, may I suggest taking an iced-over Mackinaw Bridge on a cold, windy day?

    200 feet above the water and 5 miles in total with a longest span around 3/4 of a mile long.

    image.png.a0babbb319fabb0562ae1ff39c28d9c4.png

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  10. 1 hour ago, Guadaloopy said:

    And I'd prefer we not beta test teenage drivers on roads with people on or around them.  Or beta test drivers over 75.  Or beta test drivers with over 0.05 BAC.  Or beta test driving while texting.

    There are much more significant and common risk factors on our roads than drivers using FSD.

    Because other things may be unsafe, *my* thing is not unsafe?

    Am I following the logic here?

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  11. Another datapoint.

    Sent my son's passport and passport card to State on Feb 3rd. March 15th, we get a letter in the mail saying that they can't process it because we need to send in the old passport card to get a new one.

    We have a picture of our packet with the passport card and passport and all that jazz attached just before dropping it in the envelope.

    Sigh. Same day, we filled out some form saying the passport card was "lost" (by them) and send that in. March 20th, we get an email that says "Application Status: Information Received, In Process Again."

    We shall see.

  12. 24 minutes ago, Burt said:

    What app does everyone use for podcasts? I've been using Google Podcast for the past couple of years and have loved it, but that is going away at the end of the month. Google is hoping to funnel everyone toward YouTube Music, but I'd like something that automatically downloads new episodes and hides episodes after they've been listened to. I can't stand seeing 735 episodes sitting there and having to try and remember if I've already listened to them. 

    This. Plus, I don't want to fuck with my Youtube Music algorithm, which I have dialed in right now.

  13. On 2/29/2024 at 7:51 AM, Captainant said:

    first time GIF

    Haha, I officially feel stupid for engaging a particular poster here.

    Last straw was posting the "average hours" worked chart a page or two ago, without context of how many of those people are working two or more part-time jobs.

    Disingenuous at best. Me now leaving this thread that went from kvetching over enshittening to the shit-defender batsignal going somehow going up and bringing in the bootlicker cavalry.

    image.png.553289f8c42b7c2f4f5a1e1d1ec6b840.png

     

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  14. 14 hours ago, 52-80 said:

    If you reflect on what you have just written, you might have unintentionally made a point that you probably dont want to make. 

    ignoring the fact that the total household labor participation rate was the same as today… lets assume this fictitious, idealized single-earner household, what was that picture? the man, a union factory worker, having enough for house, car, and an annual vacation?

    where do you think the woman is in that picture? her educational attainment and economic freedom?

    the quality of life for the typical/median family, or the lower-class family, 50 or 60 years ago, its not what you think it is.

    Nowhere did I say or imply that I support dual-earner with a regression to 1960s social norms. Are you being purposefully obtuse?

     

    image.thumb.gif.256f9987510718051fbd8df2a96a40a7.gif

     

     

     

  15. 1 hour ago, 52-80 said:

    You funny man.  Serious question, did you even read the post to which you are responding?

    "Cherry picked by having data start in the 80s..."

    I plotted the data from 1984, because that matches the data FROM THE PRECEDING POST, where the LOW INCOME HOUSEHOLD was first made available.  Feel free to lobby your complaint to the Bureau of Labor Services.

    "my initial post said "the 70s or something like that."

    I *also* gave you the rate of 2+ earners in the 70s.  It is 57.44%.  Which is virtually same as 2019.  It's in the 8th column in case you're having trouble.

    "25% dual earner in 1960 to 60ish percent these days is a huge jump."

    Why move goalpost to the 1960s?

    image.png.9aef2ade59a077f225bd94b602442937.png

     

    This is a larger dataset covering all married opposite-sex couples in the US.  It is not a smaller subset of married couples WITH children under 18.

    When you mention the "household income" in relation,  the household is from a large survey covering all "consumer units" (CU), not households-with-small-children? I actually like Pew Research, but the larger raw data is available to examine yourself...

     

    I set the goalposts at 70s or something like that. Never moved 'em, unless you think the 60s isn't something like that. Semantics there.

    Point is, regardless of whether 50 or 60 years ago (stop fixating on the trees and catch the forest), the transition to de facto dual-earner being required for most people is an enshittening of QOL, even if just for peace of mind that, if you choose to both work, you're not in too much trouble if one of the two earners loses their job bc you could live off of one income.

  16. 2 hours ago, 52-80 said:

    Also false.

    This is change of two-earner+ households, since the start of the 1984 income data series from above.  It's gone down.

    The average in the 1970s was 57.44%. The last measurement was in 2019 at 59%.  That is not... a double.

     

    image.png.d3ac3645af6fd956c8fabfb070240bdb.png

    This information comes from the Bureau of Labor Statistics, Current Population Survey, Annual Social and Economics Supplements 1968-2020.  And recomiled in the 2021 BLS' Womens Databook.  Feel free to verify it for yourself.

    image.png.cea56fe631a69d386305c7419e801a46.png

     

    You cherry picked by having the data start in the 80s when my initial post said "the 70s or something like that."

    25% dual earner in 1960 to 60ish percent these days is a huge jump.

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  17. FWIW, 5280, utilizing *household* income as a measure is in problematic because it doesn't account for the (something like) doubling of two-earner households since the 70s or something like that.

    QOL is often much higher when one person isn't working, but you have enough money, and you're not running errands and trying to keep up on evenings/weekends.

    To link it to the umbrella topic, it's IMO enshittification that, for most households, one-earner and all the benefits that go with that is not something sustainable.

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