I should have added that I no longer do that because I got so good with them that they no longer served that purpose. ;)

In addition to everything you said, I went through a long period where I ate everything with chopsticks so I could eat more slowly and mindfully.

A fork pierces your food, which is not always desirable.

I also had a furnished apartment, a free place to park my motorhome (which I usually lived in full-time) with power for six months (was able to run heaters in it all winter), a decent salary, I could make my own schedule, I didn’t really report to anyone, and I was brought coffee and a treat every Friday morning. So,…

Oh, this was some years ago and it was just a short nine-month contract, which is probably what makes that most amazing! He was a great leader in that he hired me to temporarily manage an apartment complex and clean it up and he let me whatever was necessary, from evicting tenants, approving new tenants, dealing with…

“and my boss is a profoundly skilled listener”

I travel a lot and until recently had a super tiny home. So while I really appreciate the thought that goes behind a physical gift, I prefer to receive a gift card to a specific store where I can go treat myself to exactly what I want. A gift card to Walmart would be appreciated, but is really impersonal and I’m more…

Only in Mexico! ;)

Definitely. The more hoity-toity sit down establishments will often add a surcharge.

Don’t know who’s the biggest idiot — the restaurant or the customers who agree to pay. Your translation is good, but misses a nuance. “le sorprenda” — who are caught. Just be discrete about it. ;)

What I always remind a friend of mine who keeps sharing this trick is that all you get more of is the tortilla. You don’t actually get an extra taco. ;)

This and my post illustrate a possible need to change the categorisation of storms...

Thank you for explaining it so clearly.

Exactly. I see 5 as being like Katrina — a city pretty much utterly destroyed, but with enough left to rebuild and 6 would not only wipe the area completely off the map but also redraw the map.

To go with this feature, here’s a radius feature that Maps for some reason doesn’t have: http://obeattie.github.io/gmaps-radius/?lat=51.500358&lng=-0.125506&z=10&u=mi&r=5

The problem is also older houses that survived Andrew and are likely grandfathered in/don’t have to meet regs.

I spent the first good winter of my life on Magnolia Beach, so I spent some time in Rockport. Beautiful little community with, at least at the time, at least one very nice police officer*. I hope the town recovers...

I was thinking the same thing. I live on the beach in Mexico’s Yucatán peninsula and unless there’s a risk of flooding, most people are advised to stay in their homes during a hurricane. These are people living in homes that are built from concrete and cement blocks and have metal shutters. I live in an expat-built…

I’m still laughing that they let you take stuff out of your suitcase and put it on, as if that changed the total weight.

I bought a really good digital scale before leaving on my trip. It was only about $10 on Amazon. What it said exactly matched WestJet’s scale at Regina’s airport, so I never had any doubt from that point on that the scales were wrong if they were over 10KG at the start of my trip and 9KG at the end.