Zebulon – traditional Biblical name. Maybe still used in Israel, but not many Americans have used it since the days of Zebulon Pike (Pike’s Peak) and Zebulon Vance (Civil War era NC governor).

I used to play a LAN game. Run around exploring a dungeon, find treasures, weapons, etc. and use them to whack on other players. One of the things you could find was a magic feather that let you walk through walls when wielded. Useful but not too powerful since it was expended with use. After about 15 minutes, if nobody had won, the game went into Armageddon mode by teleporting everyone to a small hostile room to cage match until only one survived. So I used the feather then and hopped into the wall. I could still hit and be hit by adjacent players, but was immune from all the environmental hazards that only existed inside the room.

Next game we played had a house rule to not do that anymore.

when you have to piss while shitting, do you stand up turn around and piss on your shit and then sit back down to finish shitting?

Clearing both lower ports from a sitting position isn’t a problem. The problem is when one feels simultaneous urges to defecate and vomit. I’m fortunate enough for this to be a rare occurrence personally, but I do keep a mop bucket within reach of the toilet.

This isn’t the preferred survey methodology of pollsters who care about the statistical validity of the results.

I suspect that text was from someone more interested in your money than your opinion and wouldn’t give them either.

Winning a domestic sports league and calling yourselves “World Champions”

Search engine optimizer – The entire industry, intentionally and with malice aforethought, exists purely to make it more difficult for search engines to provide quality output to search users.

I used to live in Ohio, and had three presidential candidates visit close enough to conveniently get to. I went to the Edwards, Obama (primary season), and Romney events. I didn’t order advance tickets for any of them. Both Democrats had volunteers outside the security trying to get everyone who showed up with or without tickets through security and into the main venue. At Romney’s I didn’t get in and just loitered around the outside fencing. That might have been the better experience – I could still hear the speeches, and the outside crowd had better signs and more colorful commentary than the inside ones.

You can find just about anybody’s Social Security number. (Equivalently, they can find yours.) Amazingly, some institutions still use knowledge of this number as proof of identity for purposes of extending credit to a stranger.

Historically, it’s been alleged that some ‘celibate’ Catholic bishops fucked women. When the resulting bastard children grew up, they were rewarded with coveted Church appointments. If anyone noticed the apparent favoritism, they blamed the adultery on their brother, saying the appointee was a nephew (it: nipote) rather than the priest’s own illegitimate son. Thus the origin of the term nepotism.

Probably some of them had different tastes and realized that fucking boys leaves less evidence.

Not encouraging violence against anybody. Just observing that some businesses routinely treat their customers worse than prostitutes treat theirs, and that courtesy isn’t always reciprocal.

I think sex work is more honorable than many lawful professions. It’s really unfair that prostitutes have higher rates of workplace violence than insurance sales.

Not nationally, but because Maine uses both Instant runoff voting for presidential elections, and the Congressional district method of assigning electors, it’s mathematically possibly for Maine to split its electors 2-2. eg, the Republican wins both districts individually, while the Democrat wins statewide. Not this year though – needs a competitive 3-way race so the runoffs matter.

Phil Ochs says it better than I can:

In every American community there are varying shades of political opinion. One of the shadiest of these is the liberals. An outspoken group on many subjects, ten degrees to the left of center in good times, ten degrees to the right of center if it affects them personally.

The issues have changed slightly from the 1960s, but his song’s accusations of hypocrisy and NIMBYism among those who publicly espouse progressive causes still hit close enough to home.

Gotta shake a tit.

It’s hard to predict this in advance, since it’s sensitive to things like voter turnout in non-competitive states. For instance, a blizzard in New England could affect the popular vote without impacting the electoral college vote. So I’ll just tell you how to calculate it.

First, identify the tipping point state. Some guys think it might be Michigan this year. Meaning either candidate can win by winning Michigan and every state more favorable to them than Michigan. Other good guesses are Pennsylvania and maybe Arizona. Then take the difference between a candidate’s margin in Michigan verses their national average.

2020: The tipping point state was Wisconsin. Biden won WI by 0.6% and nationally by 4.5% representing a 3.9% electoral college advantage to the Republican.

2012: The tipping point state was Colorado. Obama won CO by 5.4% and nationally by 3.9% representing a 1.5% electoral college advantage to the Democrat.

So the electoral college doesn’t intrinsically benefit the Republicans, but it probably will this year.

Becoming a victim of one also works.

Sometimes it means “We don’t want to spend a lot of money training this guy who we won’t be able to retain if he gets a better offer.”

At really entry-level jobs like fast food, where training is quick and turnover is always high, it sometimes also means "This guy might be able to read the workers’ rights poster on the door and explain the workers’ comp program to the idiot who spilled boiling grease on his foot.

I think FDA rules explicitly prohibit paying blood donors in the US. Ostensibly because if you do, the donation centers fill up with junkies who’ll lie about not having hepatitis so they can get paid, or steal IDs so they can go twice a week until they die of anemia, raising the costs of safety testing and generally being injurious to public health. Of course, everyone else involved in the process gets paid, just not the donors – quite dearly, as you’ll learn if you’re ever on the receiving end of a transfusion.

Plasma is paid because it falls under a different regulation and their research and industrial customers don’t care that the plasma came from a crack whore.

I really like approval among single-winner methods. It’s a clear improvement over plurality and encourages honest over strategic voting with 3+ candidates. Promoting candidate diversity without punishing voters for supporting them is the best way to help minor third parties become relevant.

Among ranked voting methods, I prefer Condorcet methods over others.

Instant runoff voting / single transferrable vote has some merit in the multi-winner proportional representation case, but isn’t fit for purpose as a single-winner method.

Party affiliation as listed on voter registration isn’t a loyalty oath either. It’s just a way of asking which primaries you want to vote in. You might as well pick a party with relevant primaries in your area whether you agree with their platform or not.

(Voter registration is public information and may affect which candidates and PACs send you mail.)