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dublinben's profile
dublinben

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following: 33
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hubskier for: 4557 days

Trying to leave things better than I found them.

recent comments, posts, and shares:
dublinben  ·  10 days ago  ·  link  ·    ·  parent  ·  post: Pubski: March 6, 2024

    There's not nothing in there, but the book is certainly not useful.

Thanks for the heads up. Too many non-fiction books these days would be better as a magazine article.

dublinben  ·  42 days ago  ·  link  ·    ·  parent  ·  post: 563rd Weekly "Share Some Music You've Been Into Lately"

I've been playing Caroline Polachek's second album Desire, I Want to Turn Into You on repeat for the last few weeks. It's on quite a few critics' Best of 2023 lists, but I still think she's pretty unknown in the mainstream. Her music is pretty weird to begin with, but you really have to watch the music videos to appreciate just how out there she is. Here's the first track:

    Kroger barely carries ingredients.

Trader Joes is a grocery store for people who don't know how to cook. Now that's a store that barely carries ingredients. They'll sell you five kinds of frozen Asian entrees, but not a bag of brown rice.

dublinben  ·  103 days ago  ·  link  ·    ·  parent  ·  post: Exposing violent watch thieves and their young female 'spotters'

Man, what is going on in the UK these days?

dublinben  ·  110 days ago  ·  link  ·    ·  parent  ·  post: Effective Obfuscation

    Dunning-Kruger bias among the mathematically-inclined will result in an inappropriate reliance on Bayesian statistics

Do you think this problem could be self-correcting in the long run? Won't these folks like SBF who are making faulty predictions all wind up losing one way or another?

dublinben  ·  201 days ago  ·  link  ·    ·  parent  ·  post: Student Loans Are Emerging From Deep Freeze, and Borrowers Are Confused

That money that should have been going towards student loans was saved, used to pay off credit card debt, and spent on goods and services. If anything, it was massively propping up the economy, because borrowers had hundreds of 'extra' dollars per month to support their consumerism.

dublinben  ·  203 days ago  ·  link  ·    ·  parent  ·  post: This Company Created a Return-to-Office Plan That Employees Actually Like

    about 25% of the time ... employees can live anywhere in the U.S. so long as they pay their own way to get to Orrville

This is still grossly exploitative. It would be unreasonable for any job with 25% required business travel to not reimburse employees for all associated expenses. Their own CPO admits that 2 years of work from home was successful, but these facts are clearly being overridden by the feelings of their old-school executives.

    If Orrville Mayor Dave Handwerk had his wish, Smucker employees would be back in the office five days a week

Screw this guy. This attitude is unbecoming when it's coming from the mayors of New York City and San Francisco. It is pathetic coming from the leader of a 9000 person company town. He's lucky that Smuckers is still a family-run company, and hasn't been seduced away to a neighboring state with the promise of tax breaks.

    Massey ... said she spent much of her time at Smucker in a nonmanagement role, not wanting to take on a leadership position if she couldn’t be in Orrville full-time...

    Nicole Massey lives in San Francisco and commutes to Orrville for core weeks.

Good for her for overcoming the backwards corporate culture that was thwarting her advancement. Inflexible policies like mandatory in-office days are known to harm recruiting and retention of women, minorities, and other underrepresented groups. It's no surprise why this lunchroom looks like a bag of marshmallows.

dublinben  ·  208 days ago  ·  link  ·    ·  parent  ·  post: Pubski: August 23, 2023

I'm a huge fan of gin, but I've also quit drinking. Any advice on getting started with a project like this?

dublinben  ·  234 days ago  ·  link  ·    ·  parent  ·  post: 534th Weekly "Share Some Music You've Been Into Lately"

This music-related documentary rekindled my love for some old-school UK dubstep.

As a result, I've been immersing myself in albums like this:

dublinben  ·  235 days ago  ·  link  ·    ·  parent  ·  post: Insurance companies in NYC deny coverage to buildings with subsidized tenants

Those would all be reasonable, nondiscriminatory, legitimate actuarial reasons for these decisions. Since the insurance companies can't claim that's what they're doing though, they're making it seem like something else is going on.

dublinben  ·  236 days ago  ·  link  ·    ·  parent  ·  post: Insurance companies in NYC deny coverage to buildings with subsidized tenants

There's a pretty deafening silence of the insurance companies refusing to explain their allegedly legitimate reason for taking subsidized housing into account. It leads one to conclude that the real reason must be discriminatory, or they would be able to offer an alternative explanation.

dublinben  ·  242 days ago  ·  link  ·    ·  parent  ·  post: Pubski: July 19, 2023

Your friend has great quads. Sounds like you know how to have a good time.

dublinben  ·  242 days ago  ·  link  ·    ·  parent  ·  post: Pubski: July 19, 2023

Once you've installed a brand new roof, its the perfect time to consider installing solar panels. The incentives have never been better in most places.

dublinben  ·  242 days ago  ·  link  ·    ·  parent  ·  post: Pubski: July 19, 2023

Congratulations! I hope things work out with you and your ex-girlfriend.

It sounds like you picked out the ring yourself? How did that go?

dublinben  ·  250 days ago  ·  link  ·    ·  parent  ·  post: Pubski: July 12, 2023

Cats are ridiculous creatures. They've really got us tricked. Glad to hear you got yours back safely.

dublinben  ·  251 days ago  ·  link  ·    ·  parent  ·  post: Summer Check In.

This is a tiny aside from your excellent update. But if you're ever trying to look at something on Twitter in the future, there's a great project called Nitter that allows you to do so without creating an account. For example here's one instance of it pointed to the profile of the New York Times.

dublinben  ·  278 days ago  ·  link  ·    ·  parent  ·  post: Pubski: June 14, 2023

    is this what’s it’s like to be actively living the life you’ve envisioned

hoo-rah! Sure is, bud. I'm glad to hear that you've found your climbing crew.