Thanks for the piece.

I had a similar experience with the Bells' administration. All charm and politeness, zero chance they would be persuaded to find a different way to celebrate. Also had a time tracking down who to talk to about the permit - there was nobody in city gov to be found, including the fire Marshall, who has discretion over fireworks permits or fielding community concerns, as long as the permitee meets whatever fire safety regulations are in effect.

I do remember enjoying fireworks as a kid - not the public shows, and not the boring stuff that patents supervised - the 'fun' stuff.  

What would a Bells night be like, with greatest hits reels, BBQ, music...and no explosions?  A lot of fun.

Thank you for mentioning the workers employed by SSC @Carol.  I should have mentioned that too -- they deserve our gratitude and respect, which includes good salary, benefits & working conditions -- 100%.

I've "de-googled" my life a long time ago -- would recommend it to anyone.  Google is a surveillance & advertising company.  (I remember when they used to be the Search Engine of record -- they left "Don't be evil" (their old motto) in the dust a long time ago now.)

Top 3 things you can do as first steps...

1. Change your Browser to Brave
-- If you want to get into the weeds on different browsers, you can do that here.
-- My suggestion to use Brave here is for simplicity.  It's an excellent browser, out of the box.  

2. Change your Search Engine
-- StartPage
-- Brave Search

3. Change your DNS (everyone can do this -- even if you've never heard of it -- the sites will give a how-to)
-- Quad9 (easiest)
-- NextDNS (customizeable ad-block lists)

ref: https://listed.to/@dissentious/64229/privacy-tools

SSC is very bold -- they will literally refuse to cancel service (as if they were empowered to enforce city codes --- they're not, as far as I know --- but they don't seem to care.)  It's just stunning that a company has no fear at all of it's customers (not inaccurate at all to call us captives, it seems).  Really infuriating experience with their admin office, but what was worse was getting laughed at out loud by the city attorney's office (many years ago), when I brought concerns to them (after getting bounced around the city offices, with nobody able to help, including public works).

Best you can do right now: they won't let you cancel, but you can reduce your service to the smallest tote available on a monthly pick-up schedule (you'll have to buy it yourself, if you actually intend to use it); and then take your trash and recycling to RDS on Slater for significantly less money.  It stinks to be forced to pay SSC if you're not using their service in favor of RDS -- how is that legal? (the question I asked the city attorney that caused him to laugh out loud.)  But you can save money this way regardless, and other improvements include going when you need to instead of worrying about missing pick-up day; no tote to fall over in the wind and decorate the landscaping up and down the street; one less tote blocking the sidewalk forcing pedestrians into yards or the street to get past; etc.

The retirement community near WCC (Village at Cordata Northside?) had an interesting experience last year, I hear...with gigantic food waste totes that no solitary, elderly resident could fill if they had a year to try.  I think they prevailed with the city eventually; despite SSC's initial entitlement claim to charge for the service, to get SSC to take them back and stop charging for them.

Thanks for this research.  The linked law-review article is also well done.

I really dispise Terry stops -- bad faith at their core -- whatever technicalities anyone wants to point out, on the part of cops.

Our 4th ammendment protections, in this context of driving, are also under threat by things like third-party doctrine.  As manufacturers pack ever more sensors into cars -- measuring your heart rate, attention level, how fast you accellerate or brake, where you travel, etc., not to mention everything on your cell phone (including your contacts, unsandboxed apps, etc.) when you plug-it-in to charge it or for that one song or audio-book you want to listen to -- collecting troves of data from drivers and send it off to the manufacturer, 3rd-parties, insurance providers, et al. -- who can enhance it further by connecting it to other available data from brokers, social media, etc. -- cops can search a person and their car without the driver's 4th-ammendment protections ever coming into play.  Third party doctrine says that you shared that data voluntarily with a third party, therefore have no more expectation of privacy over it. 

I displise 3rd-party doctrine even more than Terry stops -- but both need to be flushed down the can.  Whatever the 4th ammendment was supposed to do -- it's fully broken.

Thanks for writing this. 

We've had a good mix of D's and R's in the Whitehouse and Congress since my time in service -- and a continuous negative trend in retirement benefits and medical support for vets -- for all that they like to blame each other.

Everyone capitalizes on service members.  Big box stores put signs in their parking lots for vets, so everyone can see them "honoring" vets.  They also hawk credit cards with disasterous rates and fees, harvest personal data, collect license plates with their flock cameras, etc. to vets -- because that also makes them money.  The vet themself is of little consequence -- a token of virtue; a reputation boost; a business strategy.  Politicians campain on their love of vets, and their opponents' dishonoring of vets.  Vets make up a disproportionate percentage of the homeless population, and when other services aren't funded or available, we know we'll always fund jail for them.  Everyone at work likes to 'thank you for your service' at vets where others are watching.

Everyone capitalizes on service members; but I see very little 'honoring' of them.

I would have felt more honored if...
- I had other options after high school.
- my service-related medical expenses were covered.
- retirement benefits weren't reduced with every new cohort.
- sexual assault survivers in the service could report outside of their chain; maybe even to civillian oversight; and receive proper support, care, and justice.
- I would have felt more honored if the conflicts we were committed to were dignfied and necessary.
- Etc.

Thanks for bringing the Major Richard Star Act to my attention.

Some chat options are free -- including Signal, which is probably the most popular / easiest for adoption.  Others, like Threema, entail a subscription, which may present a barrier to broader adoption.

As for SMS options, and those stuck with it...  It's frustrating how un-secure SMS is, and despite being roundly recommended-against by cybersecurity professionals (for use in multi-factor authentication), many banks / credit unions still require it for that, along with some other services important to us in our daily life.  (For the curious -- do some searching for "Passkey", "FIDO2", "Hardware keys", "Yubikey", "Yubico Authenticator", etc. on the web to learn more about secure 2FA options that custodians of your money or medical records, etc. really *should be using -- and that some are rolling-out, if very slowly.)  These SMS options include services like mySudo (anonyome.com), or cloaked (cloaked.com), etc.  There is a charge for these.  It won't be easy (if possible at all) to get the political parties to stop texting your old SMS number no matter what you do -- they are relentless, and don't seem to face any consequences for their harassment (aside from what you mention in your article -- insulting voters -- and whatever consequences for their election outcomes that may entail).  But what you *can do is transition your bank, doctor, various other services, future political donations? to distinct and isolated containers with one of these services, so they're no longer sharing the SMS you get through your phone carrier.

For generations above a certain threshold (who are more dependent on voice calls for most things) -- this is where the improvement probably stops.  There is not a lot more you can do from here, and still have any hope of staying in contact with friends & family who remain committed to using phones in the traditional way.

For generations below a certain threshold (who have little-to-no use for traditional phone calls), I can offer that if you ever get a brand-new phone number -- you have the even better option of never giving it to anyone for any reason -- go 100% mySudo, Cloaked, etc. apps at that point.  When you need to call the parents or make the rare voice call -- schedule it ahead of time...

Regardless of which group you fall into -- these changes take some adjustment.  Getting your contacts to update their address book with your new number is hard enough, as we've all probably experienced at one time or another.  Getting yourself into the habit of doing SMS and/or Voice in this new way is (temporarily) bothersome itself.  If I could make one transitional recommendation here -- experiment first -- small / manageable bites (just your one small circle of friends first...work out whatever speed bumps you encounter...then add more friends & services over time), until you get the knack of the new way of doing it (and decide for yourself at that point if you can commit to it.)  I'll argue that it is worth it, due to the aforementioned security reasons -- and that recovering from Identity theft is the worse option.  But security and usability do have to balance for your day-to-day -- and that balance point will be slightly different for every individual.

... post submission didn't like my copy/paste.  Re-typing here:

For whatever it's worth -- anyone who can stop using SMS will be better-off for it.  Identity theft, privacy (in the civil rights sense of it), etc. are in the scope of concern.  If you can get your family or friend circles onto a secure chat service, you'll be better off.  (It's a big lift if you have folx in your circles that don't want to switch -- but where opportunity presents itself...totally worth it.)  Note that some popular chat apps like Whatsapp, Telegram, etc. are not as private as they claim to be -- so just be aware of that.  Here are some good options:

Chat:
- Signal (signal.org)
- Matrix (matrix.org)
- Threema (threema.com)
- SimpleX (simplex.chat)

You can also look into email aliasing -- especially handy for political messaging, advertising, etc.  (Create them when you need them; delete them when you're done with them -- they simply forward email to your real address.)

- Addy (addy.io)
- ProtonPass (proton.me/pass)
- SimpleLogin (simplelogin.io)

I hope that's helpful...

Everytime I try think about Amps, Watts, Volts, Watt-hours...  Aspirin, somebody, help...  My calculator's busted.

In non-EV-owner terms... (but who might consider buying one at some point)...

If you plug-in to the low-end CoB charger at the park for whatever your stay might be -- 1 hour, e.g. -- What does it cost you, and how many miles are added to your remaining range?

Versus if you use the high-end ones at Freddy's for an hour.

(Is worth it at all?  Are some just a waste of time to use?  Etc.)

Also curious -- what would we be looking at to install adequate solar at Bloedale -- 80 panels?  Is that what... $100k?