I agree - that’s some good college pranking. I kind of remember the police weren’t excited about it (true to any college town, Ames PD was not a fan of student hijinks). I think whoever was doing it stopped once it hit the newspaper.

I grew up in rural Iowa in the 90's. The naïve attitude at the time for a lot of farm and farm-adjacent folks was just ‘leave the keys in the ignition, nobody’s around to steal it’. Funny thing about that is that people didn’t remember to stop that habit when they went to college.  There was a series of quasi-thefts…

Exactly! We were sitting there wondering why the house lights weren’t coming up, so we walked out in the dark.

Two guys with a floor jack and a sawzall can strip a Prius in about 2 minutes (just enough time for a bystander to say, “What are those guys doing? Hey I should do something, whoops they’re gone already.”) 

I’m kind of surprised that there are so many surprised folks here in the comments. I’m living in California and this stupid shit has been going on for years. There was a lull a few years back when the state required recyclers to ask for chain-of-custody, but they apparently found a loophole because thefts are up…

Same! I can’t figure it out either.

After I saw the review here, I said “oh no, I love it.” Sounds like I’m not alone...

I can’t figure it out either. Superhero movies and LOTR are fine at 2.5-3 hours if there’s a lot of story to tell (but The Hobbit says otherwise so, counterpoint). Give me a 90-minute tidy film with a good story arc and I’m happy. Is it a sense that you don’t get your money’s worth if you don’t get 180 minutes of seat…

I read all the way through this and I have to express my dismay at the lack of a Baby Driver shoutout.

If I know I don’t have time for a real full-service meal, I try to find a local coffee option if I can (Hey Stumptown, love you boo). If I do have time though, I’ll generally hit a place with a real bar and get what I can get.

I don’t know about the others, but the Fiat has hill assist. Alex is going to be driving in a hilly town, so having that little bit of help would be nice. It’s kind of a trip for me when I don’t have to drop the clutch and/or handbrake start while on an incline.

Tortellini feels like a stroke of genius! But then I read the ‘recipe’. It’s just dry plain tortellini? No cream sauce? No vinaigrette or something? Not even cooked in with the eggs?

Just a palm-mounted dart where you slap people on the shoulder. The sting of the slap will hide the shot until you’re long gone!

I have a Logitech 933 headset, and Dolby 7.1 headphones can be incredible. Years ago, I was in one of the hectic firefights that happen all the time in Borderlands 2, and I realized I was hearing where enemies were in a natural way and reacting without having to see behind me. I’ve been sold ever since.

Quiet chuckling is basically the highest-level laughing I can get to while reading, and this one got me there.  Genuinely useful review on top of it. 

I stayed at a hostel in Edinburgh many years ago. Every morning they served a Full Breakfast with all the fixings like haggis and black sausage and baked beans. Every day they served the egg, like, medium rare - the whites weren’t even solidified. On the last day there I asked, “Can I get the egg cooked until the yolk…

Splenda makes a decent brown sugar replacement, just remember all quantities should be halved according to packaging directions.

There’s a hipster bar in my area that is nearly impossible to enjoy, due to crowds and their complete lack of acoustic deadening (opting instead for concrete and glass on all six sides of the room). That said, I go back all the time (COVID notwithstanding) due to their pretzel and cheese options. Gigantic Bavarian-styl…

Hold on, Michael. I find it very hard to believe that you’re not acquainted with the phrase “Drank the Kool-Aid” and its meaning.

I say this all the time when toddlers shoot themselves or others.  It’s 100% negligence on someone’s part.  No bullet is fired blamelessly.