Just when inflation was getting back to a reasonable level, we have this idiot, Trump, about to bring it back.
Inflation ending doesn’t mean that prices go back to where they were — it merely means that prices stop climbing rapidly. If prices returned to, say, pre-COVID levels, that would be DEflation, which has its own set of problems we don’t want or need. The Great Depression was marked by deflation in the USA.
Tariffs could bring us the worst of both worlds — inflation and recession at the same time. This is called stagflation, and it last happened here in the 1970s, which is far enough back that the majority doesn’t remember it. I remember it, but I’m 56 years old. My memories from those days involve odd/even gasoline-rationing days, and the prices of comic books and silver climbing dramatically.
Anyone who earned a decent grade in Principles of Macroeconomics knows these things. It isn’t brain science . . . or even rocket surgery.
I’ve been a coffee drinker since I was 19, but have recently acquired a taste for this particular tea, as well, which is shown in the picture above, which I “screenshotted” from Amazon. After guzzling it for several weeks, I decided to look up reviews of it, and found them at (where else?) http://www.teacritic.com. I then registered, at that website, so that I could add my own, raving, review. It’s currently the top comment on this page: https://www.teacritic.com/tea/779/tension-tamer.html. You don’t have to follow that link to see my review, though, since I took a screenshot of it for this blog-post. (You can click on it to make it bigger.)
What I didn’t put in the review, though, was my method of preparing this tea, for fear I’d be branded a tea-heretic, on the tea-critic website. I will, however, describe my method here. I get a large mug — 710 mL (that’s 24 fluid ounces, for most Americans), and drop two teabags in the empty mug. I then fill the mug with cold tap water, stick it in the microwave, and “nuke” it for three minutes. As soon as I can drink it without burning myself, I guzzle it (the way I used to guzzle beer), throw two more teabags on top of the used two bags, fill it with water, and microwave it again. After drinking this four-teabag tea, I throw away all four teabags before starting the process over from the beginning. I don’t do this at work, for I don’t have time for all of that while teaching, but I do it, on “repeat,” when I’m at home, before or after work, on the weekends, and on vacation. (Right now, it’s “Fall Break” vacation in my school district, so I’ve been doing this all day.)
I am aware that you’re “supposed to” make tea by boiling water in a kettle, and then pouring the boiling water over the teabags in a proper tea cup, but (A) I don’t have the patience for that, for my way is faster, and (B) I get a kick out of doing things my own way, rather than the “supposed to” way. Also, (C) I’m not British.
Three cheers for Celestial Seasonings Tension Tamer Tea! (No, they didn’t pay me to write this — it’s an unpaid advertisement.)
I made this using Stella 4d: Polyhedron Navigator. If you’d like to try this program yourself, you can get a free trial download at http://www.software3d.com/Stella.php.
Like many people, I’ve lately become sick of so many things. It isn’t just Donald Trump and Trumpism, nor toxic forms of religion, nor anti-science attitudes, nor Elon Musk, nor the website X (formerly known as Twitter), nor Facebook, nor Mark Zuckerberg, nor billionaires in general, nor political parties, nor the war on women, nor anti-vaxxers, nor fascists on the far right, nor Communists on the far left, nor mass incarceration, nor the wars at home and abroad, nor people who hate friends of mine just because they want to change things about themselves, such as their own bodies and names. I’m sick of people trying to destroy public education and teachers’ unions. I’m sick of all these things, and more.
Quite frankly, if you’re friend-requesting me on Facebook just to immediately send me a private message, which I call “flirtspam,” I’m sick of you. I’m married, and am not looking to change that. I’m sick of people posting advertisements on my Facebook wall, without even asking for permission first. I’m sick of of Trump and his MAGAs. I’m sick of proselytizing, for or against religion. Frankly, if you’re part of any of these problems, I’m sick of you.
It’s all these negative things, and more, that I want to leave behind. There’s poison in all this hatred, and I don’t want to die from it. Therefore, just like I left the toxic practice of drinking ethanol behind (hopefully for good, this time), on July 20, 2023, I am now leaving my negative social media exposure, with this post.
This is my last post on Facebook and on X. I’m not going to deactivate them; I just won’t be posting anything new on my own FB-wall or Twitter-feed any more. My blog is staying right where it is, at http://www.robertlovespi.net. You’re welcome to follow it, “like” my posts, or comment on them. I usually respond to my blog-comments, especially if I’ve been asked a question. More blog-posts are coming; they just won’t be shared on Facebook or X any more. My blog even has a tip jar, if you’re so inclined, but it’s completely optional and voluntary. You can see everything there for free.
You can also interact with me, if you’re seeking to form or maintain honest, healthy friendships, in one other way, on a new social media website. If you’re also sick of all this toxic hatred, which is literally poisoning our minds, our society, and our world, I will let you know where you can find me. I’ve got a lot of friends on Facebook, after all, and a few on X/Twitter, and I invite those friends to join me in the mass exodus away from those two sites, and toward the new social media platform known as BlueSky. It’s a little bit like Twitter, and a little bit like Facebook, except that it is, so far, not infected with any terminal disease. My profile page there is at https://bsky.app/profile/robertlovespi.bsky.social. All I ask is that you be willing to “give peace a chance,” if you look me up there.
I made this using Stella 4d: Polyhedron Navigator, which you can try for yourself, free, at http://www.software3d.com/Stella.php. It is made of equilateral triangles: 12(5) + 20(3) + 30(4) = 60 + 60 + 120 = 240 of them.
I’m both disgusted and infuriated with the presidential election results. I’m hoping that I can calm down, and improve my mood, by watching a blue version of my favorite Archimedean solid, spinning slowly in the darkness.
I made this with Stella 4d, which you can try for free right here.
We are such a divided nation that I have to choose separate words of advice for different types of Americans. Here goes….
To Harris supporters: VOTE, if you haven’t already! Donate to the campaign, if you can afford it! Give your neighbors rides to the polls! Call voters in swing states!
To Trump supporters: your vote is statistically insignificant. Whoever will win, will win, and there’s nothing you can do about it. You might as well just stay home on Tuesday.
To supporters of Jill Stein, Chase Oliver, or other minor party or independent candidates: your vote for a fringe candidate could possibly put that orange-faced fascist felon into the White House, again. If you can’t bring yourself to vote for Kamala Harris, at least stay home on Tuesday.
To undecided voters: vote for the smarter candidate. If you can’t tell just by listening to them talk which of them she is, then we’re all much better off if you just stay home.
Lots of people encourage everyone to vote, but that’s just not me. I’ve already voted for Harris, bought bumper stickers for our cars, and made three cash contributions to the Harris campaign. I want us to win!
I already posted one prediction-map for the 2024 presidential election, but that was back when Joe Biden was running for re-election. Since the Democratic candidate changed, I changed my prediction-map.
Give the polyhedron below a quick glance. Can you name it?
Since there are twelve regular pentagons, and a bunch of hexagons, it looks like a soccer ball. The shape of the most widely-used soccer ball is a (rounded) truncated icosahedron. Therefore, you can be forgiven if you thought this thing was a truncated icosahedron. Take a close look at those hexagons, though. Can you see that they are not regular?
Contrast the solid above to the shape below, which is a real truncated icosahedron.
The hexagons in this second image are regular, but that isn’t the only difference between the two. Examine the vertices of solid #2. At each vertex, one pentagon meets two hexagons. Scroll up and take another look at solid #1, and you can easily find vertices there which also have two hexagons meeting a pentagon — but not all of the vertices are like that. Some of the vertices have three hexagons meeting there, without any pentagons at all. This allows more hexagons into the mix, while the number of pentagons stays steady, at twelve, in both polyhedra.
There are also other differences. For example, the “fake” truncated icosahedron has eighty vertices, while the real one has sixty. The first solid is actually the dual of a frequency-2 geodesic sphere. It’s not an Archimedean solid at all. It is, in chemistry, a fullerene; in fact, both shapes are fullerenes. One is the well known C60 molecule, while the other is a less familiar fullerene with the formula C80.
Both of these polyhedra can be built using Zometools (available for sale at http://www.zometool.com). The truncated icosahedron requires sixty Zomeballs, and is made of all blue struts. The geodesic-sphere dual takes eighty Zomeballs, and is made of blue and red struts.
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