sevan

When I used to make cider, I used store-bought juice and fermented with safale s-04. I like my cider slightly sweet, so after fermentation I would add some frozen apple juice concentrate to sweeten it and then keg it and refrigerate it immediately so the added sugars don't ferment.

I haven't made any in a long time, but I always liked using Safale S-04 for my ciders.

I'm not 55 yet, but I was also way more into online games when I was in my 20s than I am now.

Also, there's this common "feature":

Dr: "You need this procedure."

Me: "How much will it cost me?"

Office Manager: "I won't know until I bill your insurance and find out if it is covered."

Me: "What is the cash price I would pay you if it isn't covered by insurance."

Office Manager: "I have no idea."

I'm definitely in agreement now, it just took me a bit longer to get over the shift in social norms.

Great points on the horrible quality of sound in these places. I was referring more to the selection of music, but playing it at low quality certainly makes it worse. My kids joke that the grocery store is where old pop songs go to die.

Wow, I assumed this was related to the use of prison labor in Alabama. I guess McDonald's has a long ways to go before they get to "better".

According to the suit, C.B.A.K., a McDonald’s franchisee, employed at least 122 incarcerated workers between 2018 (the beginning of the period covered by the suit) and September 2023. C.B.A.K. workers allegedly were coerced to work for the company. The suit alleges that violent and unsafe conditions within the Alabama prison system, in addition to the ADOC’s prohibition of work stoppages, effectively coerced workers into accepting employment.

One McDonald’s worker, who asked for time off for mental health, was told “any failure to work, even for health reasons, will be considered a refusal to work and will result in a disciplinary offense,” per the suit.

At least one worker at an Alabama Kentucky Fried Chicken was denied parole after refusing to work due to a low wage rate that was subject to deductions by prison officials...The DOC’s system of deductions meant workers nominally paid Alabama’s $7.25 minimum wage earned, in effect, as little “$2.06 per hour.”

I used to judge people for going about their daily lives with headphones on (like shopping) as being antisocial. In the last few years, I've come to realize they were just quicker to realize how annoying our society is and I'm increasingly likely to join them.

Recently I went to a mall and visited all the department stores. One of them had a guy playing a piano live and my first thought was "how quaint". Then, as I sat and waited for my wife to try things on it struck me that I wasn't hearing horrible music played over speakers - the piano was really nice. Why can't places go back to playing relaxing music like that (even recorded)?

Right, and that's assuming he doesn't just use his "dictator for a day" plan to remove anyone from Congress that opposes him. That's how other authoritarians create a sham democracy.

They way over-complicated it. Once he installs loyalists (as in their step 1), he can just round up anyone he wants, send them to a private prison run by an aligned billionaire, and ignore the courts. If the people in the departments controlled by the executive are willing to break the law, Congress and the courts don't really have any tools to combat that.

If its for older kids (8-12 and able to read reasonably well) you could check out the Warriors, Survivors, and Seekers series by "Erin Hunter". This is not an actual author, but a group that churns out tons of books from the standpoint of cats, dogs, and bears.

My kids adored the Warriors books (fantasy stories where all the characters are cats) and they are still into fan fiction as mid-teens. My wife and I read the first one with them when they were around 5-6 years old and it was so awful we refused to ever read another with them again. I think my oldest learned to read about that time just so she could keep reading them after that. At this point I think they own 20-30 of these books and enjoyed them immensely.

This week my kids both started reading Journey to the West, which is a set of 16th century Chinese novels written by Wu Cheng'en. I don't think it is quite what you're asking for, but I gather that a significant portion of it revolves around Sun Wukong, the Monkey King. I think they bought this Kindle version for $4. Apparently the Monkey King is the character in the recent game Black Myth: Wukong, which has made the book popular again.

I once had to post a position that was specifically made for my employee, but my recruiter was awesome. I told her there was no possibility I would pick anyone else, so she suggested I make the requirements hyper specific. So, I met with my employee and we worked up a list of 10-20 things that she had done in her career and put them all in as requirements to qualify.

I received no other "qualified" applicants, so I only had to interview the one. My next meeting with her I said, "this is your official interview, do you have any questions for me?" She said "no" and I congratulated her on being selected for the role.