alamortsubite

You're absolutely right! I was excited about this book, having heard Ms. Jacobsen discuss it on a podcast. She was a great guest, and her book is well researched, for sure. Unfortunately, I found the prose unbearable and gave up half-way through. To me, it reeks of LLM. If you can somehow set that aside, you might enjoy it.

I wouldn't let that concern me at all. Large sections of the Appalachian Trail (including all of PA) are extremely rocky. It's hell on shoes. Having said that, I much prefer my Nike trail shoes to the Speedgoats I had.

U.S. chains like IHOP and Denny's beat the mom-and-pop immigrant restaurants by decades (and they are truly terrible). I wouldn't be surprised if they got the idea from even lower quality chains like McDonald's, but I'm not old enough to know.

If you DM your provider through their health portal it's likely they'll write an order without requiring an office visit.

As opposed to a moisture farmer, presumably: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aran_Islands#History

If you're never seen Man of Aran, you're in for a treat! Far more thought provoking than the fluff Lucas made, but by which I always assumed his fictional homestead on Tatooine was inspired.

It's not that complicated. When you buckle your unibody, you'll understand.

Obviously, but the question I was responding to was, "Why buy a sleek phone made of premium materials just to bury it in the cheapest, ugliest, chunkiest plastic case you can find?"

In an ICE pickup, maybe, but assuming the Slate has an EV weight distribution advantage, RWD is probably better. To each their own, but I much prefer my driven wheels not to be my turning wheels.

That said, lack of 4WD is really a bummer.

A 4x8 trailer is also a great option, if you have a place to keep one, and super cheap. I have a Thule that stands on end in the garage. Trailers are a lot easier to load and unload than an American pickup, too. It seems like every time I take mine to the Home Despot I see someone struggling to get materials into their SUV or short-bed pickup, and I'm in and out in a flash. Just don't expect to win any races driving in reverse.

Size has nothing to do with it. The Rangers were body on frame.

Entertainment, telemetry, weapons systems?

Plenty of people buy expensive phones for the specs and features, yet either have no interest in jewelry or see it as a negative status symbol.

Or clothes, if you really want to do it right, like Madeline Khan's character in High Anxiety.

If you've lived in Australia, I'm back to thinking you're being wholly disingenuous, and certainly evasive. I'll steer clear of engaging with you in the future.

I don't know why you were down-voted, but I agree.

It's also alarming how often you see people towing trailers that aren't even close to being level here. It almost seems like SOP.

You wrote that Australia has plenty of brodozers. Crossovers are not brodozers, nor is it possible to operate a brodozer on public roads in Australia. Clearly, you're misinformed, if not entirely disingenuous, but your commitment to stay the course is admirable.

> Vehicles with 40s on them and a 6” lift are so rare in America they have no statistical significance in regard to accidents.

Do you have a source for this? Asking as someone who recently narrowly escaped death with a loved one as victims in a highway rollover crash caused by a dimwit operating a brodozer with 40" mud tires and a 6" lift in America.

Well, in his case he has full technical competency but he's missing a leg, but I agree with the point you're making.

Kafka was way ahead of his time when he wrote Der Bau!

Sorry, I'm just trying to understand your point of view. I live in the US and spend a lot of time in the EU. I'm a citizen of both. It couldn't be more obvious to me that our street designs differ (as implied by my previous comment). I'd genuinely like to know where you're coming from, but your responses so far are shallow tautologies. I initially responded to your comment, "Fixing on the pedestrian safety yields higher death counts overall" (I assumed you meant "fixating on pedestrian safety," but perhaps this was a mistake). I'm curious how you came to that conclusion. Can you please elaborate, and what was my stupid "jump and conclusion," precisely?

Those really only work in very dry climates. So some of Europe, but not places like the UK where the conference was cancelled.

Maybe I misinterpreted, but I think they meant that if the American market didn't exist, neither would most of those models.

I guess I'm old fashioned but I just can't imagine removing the cab to change my uncle's battery.

I see. So you believe that if Europeans designed their streets to be less safe for pedestrians, like they are in the U.S., then their overall vehicular death rate would go down. Is that right?

There have been several studies showing driver assistance systems cause a psychological shift that leads to drivers not paying attention. I guess we have to ask ourselves if we want to encourage people to pay attention while driving, or just leave it up to the latest vibe-coded OTA update Tesla's pushing out.

I'm glad backup cameras are mandatory, though.

You led with "people just hop right out onto zebra crossings expecting the right-of-way to be yielded to them." I think framing it this way was a mistake and the cause of your frustration. People in zebra crossings do have the right of way, regardless of whether they hopped there or what there expectations are, full stop.

Your point about modern A pillars is right on the money.

How do you reconcile your viewpoint with the non-pedestrian vehicular death rate in Europe? Do you think the reason deaths are so much lower there is because Europeans are unconcerned with pedestrians?

And if you're over 18? In my state it's 1) an easy written test, 2) a few minutes driving around a parking lot, and 3) here's your license kid, have at it.

Not ban but states can implement stricter licensing requirements for larger vehicles, and raise registration fees, gasoline taxes, and penalties for their misuse. See how Paris is handling SUV in the city center. It's very effective and other cities are likely to follow.

Yes but Americans commonly tow massive fifth wheels at over 120 kph (regardless of tire rating and including up and down steep grades, transmission and brakes be damned) because why wouldn't you, and the sum total of the training they receive for operating such rigs in this manner is a rubber stamp at the DMV.

I'd go a step further and say the high hoods reduce utility by making the vehicles harder to work on. I'm 6' and needed a step-stool to change the battery on my uncle's Silverado. The truck manufacturers leave that inconvenient detail out of their macho ads on TV.