Croc

My wok is carbon steel, and it was a bitch to properly season (sesame oil, of course). Great wok. Company has really high quality and ridiculously low prices for what you can get. Can't remember if I have the 12" or 14", but I highly recommend this wok.

Have you ever cooked rice or pasta? It boils over. That's just what it does. One second it's fine, the next starch bubbles are everywhere because it erupted like Old Faithful. My main issue with electric is that if you are doing any kind of frying or stir-frying, electric isn't powerful to protect against temperature drops when you add ingredients. Thing is, especially with stir-frying, everything should cook rapidly and not absorb much oil; if you use gas, you still need plenty of BTUs to keep the wok temp up when you add your ingredients so it cooks quickly...otherwise, temps drop, food doesn't cook quickly, and it absorbs a ton of oil. Gross. Even my parents' gas stove couldn't keep up with stir-frying room-temp, sliced veggies properly; once we built the outdoor kitchen and opted for two very powerful side burners with the grill, our equipment was finally sufficient to do any kind of stir-frying.

My family's house still has the original, giant 1933 boiler unit.

Perfectly understandable. I haven't checked in a while, but I know that tankless units at least used to be eligible for tax credits/rebates. They probably make the most sense for income properties, with the inherent write-offs in that scenario.

What about tankless electric water heaters? Also, government rebates/tax incentives certainly reduce the cost further.

Tank vs. tankless is all about energy costs of heating said water. The relevant comparison figure, water HEATING costs, would be less with a tankless.

I try to be a little greener because it's the right thing to do. I buy many of my groceries at Whole Foods because I'm lazy; I'd rather pay more than have to read every fricken label on everything to see if hydrogenated oils, preservatives, or high-fructose corn syrup is in a product...or if the ingredient list reads like a biochemistry book index. I'd love to get a tankless heater because it's space-efficient, with the added savings just being icing on the cake. Also, how would one NOT net savings from a tankless heater, even if they took longer showers? Let's just say you shower for 2 hrs. That means the tankless heater works for 2 hrs to heat the water...versus 24/7 for the tank heater, which heats and reheats water to maintain the set temperature, whether the water is used or not.

Where are you getting your information? I didn't see it in the linked article.

The article quite clearly stated they were factory-spec.

Dear God. It's going to be really hard for Cadillac to woo buyers from the Germans and Japanese when the taste level of GM's midwestern executives is so "pink-flamingo-meets-lawn-gnome chic." Don't get me wrong, I'm all for increasing interior color options...but that yellow says "screaming chicken" more than it does "Standard of the World."

Wait. Please tell me that's a lighting trick and those aren't YELLOW inserts in the CTS-V Coupe seats?!?!? Dear God that's tacky...

We went on a tangent. If you'd like, we can try to bring it back now, but reg's gotta be on board, too.

I hate to nitpick because I agree with everything else you posted, but LA doesn't have sprawl. LA is an extremely polycentric city with a lot of density, and the centers just grew together. Sprawl is used to describe low-density, underutilized land that just keeps going away from the center. Even "low-density" residential neighborhoods in LA are pretty damn dense. Now you wanna talk Inland Empire? That has some sprawl characteristics. Atlanta is a good example of urban sprawl. Los Angeles isn't though.

Agreed, but I think the massive amounts of cultural exchange have a larger role than you're giving credit toward. Also, a lot of times super-common mispellings simply become acceptable, and then standard, much like grammar evolves based on changing times. Also, many of the silent letters weren't pronounced...but the words were borrowed or evolved from other languages where that combination of letters created the necessary dipthong. I don't agree. I've never noticed people failing to pronounce the "d" in sandwich, or the "st" in Christmas, especially since Christmas refers to "Christ." Those just look nasty to me. Until China simplifies its characters, I'm not going to worry about the nuances of the English language like they need fixing LOL

Again, you don't know what you're talking about. As "liberal" as California has the reputation of being, it's a pretty "law and order" state. Look up the mandatory minimum sentences, the penalties and fines that multiply the cost of a minor traffic violation, the anti-drug enforcement policies, etc. 1) I'm not on a high horse. You accused my state of being a busybody that tries to dictate national policy, and I'm just refuting that, which is pretty easy to do. When the US doesn't handle the job the way we want things done, we do it ourselves. All you "states rights" people should be overjoyed at California's self-sufficiency, instead of bemoaning the consequences of a state with a huge population and large economy effectively dictating national policy because businesses recognize the market incentives of providing products and services that can be sold in this state. Where's the inflated values? The cost of living is NOT artificially inflated. This is very basic market economics at work--namely supply and demand, with demand seemingly neverending and supply obviously having finite limitations, especially with regards to land use. Also, we do not import all of our water, we do not import all our power, and we most certainly do not depend on illegals for cheap labor. Illegal immigration is drastically down from what it used to be, and quite frankly the NATIONAL trade policies are responsible for the outsourcing of what used to be a wide range of well-paying manufacturing jobs to places like Mexico and Asia. California cannot enact import tariffs and California cannot really do much statewide OTHER than eliminate environmental protections, which are non-negotiable. California smog is the reason the Clean Air Act exists, and played a huge part in the formation of the EPA. The problems are NOT largely self-created. The end of the Cold War ended the middle class defense contract industry's dominance, and NAFTA and other international free trade policies outsourced OUR jobs.Where is California overstepping its bounds? Last time I checked it was Arizona that was being sued for violating the US Constitution by attempting to usurp power from the national government in the areas of immigration and naturalization. They sure do, and we are very grateful that some people choose to move away, thereby reducing our infrastructure demands and housing shortage from what they would otherwise be. Hell yea. Again, you miss the point completely. There is no ego, other than in the minds of outsiders. Californians do not think about much else beyond the borders. We mind our own business and try to solve our OWN problems. States' rights, and all that. The other 49 states would still exist, but federal infrastructure funding would be a lot tighter. Look at the cash flows; California in effect subsidizes the other 49 because we get back far less in Federal funding than we contribute. We already have a state government, so I'm not sure what extra expenses would be incurred there. We also spend a $h! ton of money on police. Roles would be transitioned, but we already have plenty of army bases and many people who enlist, so I don't see how that would be a problem at all. Can't give away the farm. Fact is, it's a lot cheaper to do business elsewhere. I'm sure we'd love to reopen those shuttered auto plants in Van Nuys, Fremont and Huntington Park. So it's moved somewhere more remote--that's just fouling up more land and air, with less oversight because it's all "out-of-sight, out-of-mind"...at least until the employees decide to move around the factory because commuting 3 hours into the hinterlands just isn't appealing to most working families.

Well, like Britain, Canada still recognizes Queen Elizabeth II as Head of State. Maybe that's why linguistics have stayed similar to Britain, whereas the USA diverged 2.3 centuries ago, gained cultural influences from Africa, Mexico, South Pacific, South America and Central America, leading to new linguistic traditions as everything amalgamated. Just a guess.

Reg, I'm disappointed in you. This is one of the most uninformed goddamn things I've ever read. Go get a book, and read it. You might learn something about why Los Angeles has really bad pollution, even now that cars are as clean as they are and most of our factories have packed up and moved to Mexico. We also don't jam ourselves full of residents; what do you want, city-wide naturalization like the country has? This is market demand, dude. You put one of the best (if not THE best) US climates together with breathtaking scenery, the ability to surf in the morning and snowboard in the afternoon, cultural amenities, etc. and guess what? People for some reason want to live here! Land is finite. Therefore real estate prices are incredibly high. Go on Zillow and check out what homes sell for in LA County. Not as expensive as Manhattan, but it's still pretty expensive. Yet people keep coming. Oh, and a quick Google search will reveal that we have a chronic housing shortage. We aren't encouraging people to move here. Home values are really high. Orange County may have been hit hard, but look at what those homes are going for, even in foreclosure.

Explain. IMO California is the strongest of the weak. False. I have explained this numerous times in previous threads; Californians do not give a $h! about the rest of the country. Californians only care about California. Consider this for a second: California economy and world economies Gross Domestic Product (GDP) in $ trillion 1. United States (14.16) since California is in this list, this figure should be (12.31) 2. Japan (4.91) 3. China (4.33) 4. Germany (3.65) 5. France (2.86) 6. United Kingdom (2.68) 7. Italy (2.3) 8. California (1.85) 9. Russia (1.68) 10. Spain (1.6) ...aaaaaaaaaand this: Source: EconPost So, if the above facts don't help you understand why Californians are indifferent of the rest of the country, you'll just have to trust me on this. If California were to secede and become its own sovereign nation, not only would a lot of people think "it's about time!" but the US would go into civil war...again...because a whole hell of a lot of tax dollars come from the Golden State. Bottom Line: California is crafting legislation to deal with its own issues as it sees fit. That's the motivation. We don't care about any other states, or really the country as a whole. What is this "learn to work together" bull$h!? Businesses exist for the sole purpose of making money, as beholden to shareholders/Board of Directors--that's the definition of a business. The government is supposed to represent the will of the people as representative officials are elected. Since businesses are trying to MAKE MONEY and PERPETUALLY INCREASE STOCK VALUATION, that is what their priority will be. The mind-numbingly obvious relationship between the two entities will always be one of business trying to maximize profits by spending the least amount of money possible with the government creating a legal framework and needing to provide oversight to ensure the laws aren't being ignored. Now, if you want an entity that cooperatively works with the government sometimes to provide a service, product, etc., those are generally called Not-For-Profits because...BECAUSE THEY AREN'T TRYING TO MAKE MONEY, AND AS MUCH MONEY AS POSSIBLE.

I'm all for it, but I doubt Prop 19 passes now that NAACP endorsed it, created controversy, and now got it all up on everyone's radar. It'll be close, though. Will I use it? No, not really. I'm allergic to it, though occasionally I'll have a hit or two...and then I'll throw up. No worries, though...I prefer uppers.

California spent so much time ignoring the negative side of business that now environmental protections are non-negotiable. As a result, California is now an "anti-business" state because it won't give away the health of the environment so a chemical company can, say, set itself up in unincorporated LA County and cheaply remove its toxic DDT via the sewer system. Or a factory set itself up in Los Angeles or the San Joaquin Valley with smokestacks filling the sky with smog 24/7. Or a defense contractor setting up a nuclear test facility in Santa Susana, blowing radiated dust all over the San Fernando Valley. Imagine that, the cost of business goes up when you have to properly dispose of your waste. It isn't California's fault that the rest of the majority of US States have alarmingly weak environmental laws.

And "cookie" used to be spelled "cooky," while "donut" was "doughnut" etc. "Colour" isn't American English anymore!

"Colour"?? Clearly, this is not an American endeavor.

This is asinine. The biggest emissions occur at startup. It is far better to idle at a light than shut off the engine, turn it back on, and drive off. These Germans must be really, really dumb.

OK I outdid myself for the 4th of July--I made greenbean casserole from SCRATCH yes homemade cream of mushroom soup. Soooooo good. For the soup: Saute 1/2 c grated yellow onion in 6 Tb of melted butter. Blend in 4.5 Tb flour, 1 Tb salt, .5 Tb Paprika. Stir in 3 c half and half and 3 c vegetable stock and heat until the boiling point. Add in porcini mushrooms (chopped), season with black and cayenne pepper, and simmer to reduce for about 45min-1 hr. (you want it nice and thick). Green beans: Boil a large pot of water. Chop a generous amount of thick-cu bacon and add to boiling water. Grate remainder of yellow onion (from above) and add to boiling water and bacon. Wash and slice 2 lb fresh green beans, and boil until "al dente." Pour through a colander, retaining the bacon and onion. Remove remaining fat from bacon, if desired. Fill a casserole with the beans and no more than half of the soup. Top with crispy onions (available at Whole Foods) and bake at 350 until the onions are browned, and the casserole is bubbling. Sorry, I don't have anything more specific than that...maybe 15-20min? As for the leftover soup? It's so good you'll be happy there's some leftover for later

It really is. My father needed assistance with his iPod, and so he went to the Apple store. Guess what? If you weren't one of the 2,000 people waiting in line for an iPhone 4, you weren't admitted into the store. That's right, no customer support, no returns, no purchasing other things that are way more expensive than an iPhone 4, nada. They couldn't even tell us if another Apple store were open. Apparently, they closed down their entire store except for iPhone 4 sales, and didn't even think that they might want to check with other area stores as far as customer support goes. And those people waiting in line on launch day? Wrappped around the f@#king mall twice. Did they not realize that the phone would be available in another week? Jesus...