This feels like Bender breaking up with the Planet Express Ship in the middle of battle.

“Eh, the moment seemed right.”

On our honeymoon, where we stayed we got a credit that we could use towards the spa or the high-end fine dining restaurant on the site. We chose the restaurant and even with the credit I think our bill was over $200, before tip. It was by far the best meal I’ve ever had, though, and our waiter was excellent, far beyond anything I’ve ever had before or since. He had extensive experience in fine dining, previously working many years in New York City at famous places, I think the Waldorf Astoria or something like that. That was when I understood the level of skill that can be attained in that career and how important that is to the fine dining experience.

My kid does this

Historically I would say I’m not a fan of turning over so much control to the car. However, since 2022 we’ve typically driven up to see my wife’s parents twice a year, a journey of roughly 1,200 miles/2,000 kilometers each way, because even flying normally wouldn’t get us to their rural Quebec town much faster and would cost a lot more. We got a newer Hyundai a couple years ago and it has some self-driving features taking advantage of the adaptive cruise control and lane-keeping systems. It can even change lanes itself when you activate the turn signals, although you still have to keep your hands on the steering wheel and that doesn’t work well half the time. I have found it works well enough in rural freeways with little traffic, and if I use it in those areas I’m able to handle more of the driving share on the trip and seem to be more alert and fresh in the heavier traffic areas around major cities. I test drove one or two GM vehicles that had a completely hands-off system, which I found freaky, but would probably appreciate even more in those rural stretches.

Whatever inspires you!

Try melting them together!

Look at Ms. Moneybags; I’ve seen pastry chefs go into that much debt in culinary schools just to make $30,000/year!

Google:

This happened all the time on the New York Subway when I lived there 20+ years ago. But there you were usually only 2-5 minutes away from the next station and you had the ability to go to a different car, so most people just ignored them. You’re not going to find many commercial flights that are less than an hour gate to gate, though, and frequently many hours in duration.

I’m realizing I like smash burgers from fast food places. For me Shake Shack tops that list, with Freddy’s a close second. I was surprised at how good I thought Sonic’s smash burger was since I usually haven’t been overly-impressed with their food. Not a smash burger, but I do like Five Guys, although they’re really expensive. None of those I would describe as particularly fast, though.

For something that’s actually fast, as in my food can be ready as soon as I get to the window from when I ordered at the drive-thru intercom I’d say Wendy’s is currently my favorite. They changed their burgers after founder Dave Thomas died and I haven’t liked their changes to the traditional lineup, but the Double Stack or Baconator/Baconator Jr. are good. The others like McDonald’s, Burger King, Hardee’s/Carl’s Jr. are consistent, rarely bad but also rarely great. You’re in Canada and I’ve noticed when we go visit my wife’s parents up there that McDonald’s is often running some limited-time variant on their burgers, often the quarter pounder, and sometimes they’ve been good, or at least interesting. We don’t seem to get those in the US, so if you want a fast food burger you might want to at least try them since you have easy access.

My recommendations might not mean much, though, because I haven’t been particularly impressed with the A&W burgers I’ve had in Canada. I’ve already forgotten what I really don’t like with them even though I had one a few weeks ago, but I think it’s something like the buns are weirdly grainy and the meat is loose and has an odd flavor. I like the root beer, though, in spite of your paper straws that start breaking down way too fast.

People keep acting like this is unprecedented, and maybe it hasn’t specifically happened this way before, but boom/bust seems to happen every few years.

To hear my dad and other older folks talk, though, it sounds like things were really good in the ’90s and they haven’t seen commission checks like that since.

Emporia, Virginia is another notorious one, right on heavily traveled I-95 as well as US-58. Virginia has front license plates, so the cars that don’t have front plates definitely aren’t from Virginia and if there’s a group of cars all going the same speed it’s the easy way to pick out the non-local. Saw it happen when I was a passenger.

I’m assuming one or two significant players will go bust, but probably not the biggest like Google, Microsoft, Amazon. They might take some serious hits, and they’ll deprioritize AI, but still exist. Maybe someone like Oracle or xAI goes under and gets parted out like an airliner getting scrapped. A lot of data center projects will be cancelled, others will shut down, and the local politicians that pushed for those data centers will see their political careers end as their districts are left with big empty buildings and infrastructure debts that will be hard to pay.

Even when it was easily proven incorrect it remained a common talking point from people opposed to EVs. Much of that opposition was for ideological/financial reasons, so facts didn’t really matter.

I think the smaller character limit comes in from Asian countries if they don’t use the basic Latin characters that came out of ASCII. But yes, there’s no reason for the service provider not to offer unlimited SMS messages other than greed/lack of competition. I remember over 20 years ago reading a high level phone company employee talking about how the SMS plans were basically printing money for the phone companies because it cost them almost nothing in terms of bandwidth, utilizing an otherwise unused part of the connection protocol. Back then most companies charged for the messages as in @OP’s question, and the plans were relatively expensive. Nowadays most plans I see in the US and Europe offer unlimited talk and text, or limits that are so high they would be hard to reach. I think it’s a combination of competition and smart phones offering SMS alternatives that offer more functionality while using a tiny fraction of your data allowance, or none if you’re on WiFi.

Five years is too long for the buyers. The AI bubble will burst before then and then the market price will drop as the inflated demand disappears, especially if this continues long enough for more production capacity to come online.

They might not have had much of a choice in making the deal, though. Micron has been extracting the absolute maximum they can out of this situation. Make a deal or get nothing. Their clients will remember, though, and flag them as an unreliable supplier. Once this ends—and these always end—they’ll likely have a lower market share and end up having to cut prices.

Micron is optimistic in saying the demand won’t start easing until 2028. A lot of the rest of the technology manufacturing industry is about to grind to a crawl if not a halt because it’s nearly impossible to get components. Some companies are already delaying product launches and I think a lot more are about to this summer as they realize what’s happening. If non-AI businesses start to slow, the whole economy starts to slow, the AI demand will falter and that’s when the bubble bursts. I’m thinking maybe by the end of this year, more likely next year.

When the bubble bursts I’m guessing at least a couple of the companies Micron signed SCAs with will fold and Micron won’t get anything.

I’m generally of the opinion that it’s better to express your feelings for someone at some point than to hold back and continue spending time with them in a way that becomes a form of torture for yourself. Better to hear a no and move on than to waste time on something that won’t happen. Maybe don’t ask immediately, give yourself time to try to see if your feelings are real or a passing crush. And try to figure out if they’re even generally open to a relationship. Assuming they’re not already in a relationship with someone, is it because they are happy being single and not looking? Have they recently gotten out of a relationship and want to take time to focus on themselves? If they’re not likely to want a relationship with anyone right now, save yourself some awkwardness and try to move on. Otherwise, if it seems like an appropriate time, see what happens.

SMS is 160 characters. In the early days Twitter really only functioned over SMS. The Twitter 140 character limit was to fit the message inside an SMS with room for other info like usernames.

Not right now. I would like a Steam Deck for the portability but haven’t been able to get my hands on one so far (less inclined to buy a different option given the Deck’s repeatability/upgradability). Maybe in the future, if prices come down, but it would need to have games that make sense to play on a TV, ideally with friends or family, that I can’t play on something I already own.

I don’t know if mine is actually steam but having a machine feels like it’s been a good investment as a pet owner. Our dog is very good about going outside to potty but she does throw up from time to time and she will always try to find the limited amount of carpet we have in our house (I think it’s the closest thing to grass in her mind). Maybe it would be cheaper still to go rent a machine, but the convenience of being able to use it right away also has to be considered.