March 13 [Daylight Saving Time]
March 13
Today was a special day, although I didn't know it when the day began.
When Aric and I finally got out of bed, he went around and started changing all the clocks in the house. I asked him why he was doing it, and he said that today was the first day of Daylight Saving Time, then explained to me how in the springtime, every clock was set forward an hour, and then in the fall they'd be set back.
I wanted to know why, and he said that he wasn't sure. He said that it was kind of stupid, since you had to get up an hour earlier, although in the fall it was nice because you got to sleep an hour later. He thought that it had been started during the war, and then they'd just kept on doing it, although there were some places in America that didn't, which made things even more confusing.
I couldn't see it being an idea ponies would go for, especially if the only benefit was that you got to get up an hour earlier, and I couldn't imagine why people did it. Everyone I knew liked to sleep late except when there was something really fun happening, like snowboarding at Boyne Mountain.
Aric said that sometimes tradition trumped practicality. When people have done something one way for a long time they don't like to change even if the new way is better. I guess that’s true; a lot of ponies are that way too.
We walked down the street for a late breakfast together at Nina's, and then went back to the house. He didn't want me to leave and I didn't want to either, but I had to study and work on my essay. So we came up with a compromise where he drove me back to campus and I got all my notes and then we took them back to his house.
He promised not to be too much of a distraction, and he said that he had assignments he had to work on, too, so he sat on his bed and did stuff on his laptop while I sat at his desk and started writing my essay for philosophy class.
I'd decided to write about Kant. He was kind of the dividing line between philosophers that I agreed with and ones I did not and maybe if I examined his work a little more deeply, I'd see why the newer philosophers had gone wrong.
It was nice to study together with Aric, and it was really fun to take the occasional study break. After the first, he just put his shirt back on so that he wouldn't be cold, and covered the lower half of his body with his blankets.
By dinnertime, I'd gotten most of the essay done, and Aric and I had gone over my climate science notes one more time. I was feeling pretty good about the upcoming exams.
He gave me a ride back to campus, and we carried my stuff back up to my room. Then he said that since he was here, he might as well go to dinner with me.
He had to move Winston—it wasn't allowed to be in the parking lot because he didn't have a proper parking permit for it. He said that only students who lived in the dorm could use the dorm parking lots, and that there was a lottery on those spaces because there weren't enough of them.
There was a spot open behind the dining hall where he could park, and we went in the back way.
We ate in the dark room with all his Durak friends. They were a bit surprised to see him, since he didn't eat at the dining hall all that often because it was kind of expensive if you didn't have a meal plan like everyone else there did.
Everyone chatted for a while after dinner was over, then people started trickling off to do more studying.
He thought it would be a good night to walk around town for a little bit, and I thought that would be interesting as well. I'd flown over it plenty of times, but I'd never walked through it.
I did cringe a little bit as we walked past Walgreens, but Aric was with me so I knew it would be okay.
Even though we could go whichever way we wanted to, he followed the traffic directions. We went to where the two one-way streets came together, and stopped at a little tiny coffee store called the Water Street Coffee Joint, which is where David’s girlfriend Angela works. She was there, and we chatted a little bit and Aric bought himself a coffee and asked me if I wanted one, but I thought if I had one it would keep me up all night.
When we walked back outside, he pointed down to a round metal lid and told me that he knew what was under that. He said that those were the storm drains, David had decided that they ought to explore them, so one night they'd gone in there. He told me that if I was interested, maybe we could do it later in the year, when the snow had melted—it was too dangerous to go there now, because we could be trapped underground.
I wasn't sure I'd want to go. The thought of being underground was kind of scary. But he insisted on at least taking me and showing me where the entrance was, so we walked a little bit further, past the big sign that welcomed people to Kalamazoo, and crossed the street by a gas station, then went through a dirt parking lot.
He used his telephone as a flashlight so we could get down a little embankment, and then pointed to a big concrete arch and said that was it. A small trickle of water was coming out of it and going into the river.
I didn't like it; it looked like the kind of place a monster might live. It also smelled stagnant, like a swamp or bog.
We'd just gotten back to the top of the embankment when a bell started clanging. A moment later, I heard a train horn that made me practically jump out of my coat, and a spotlight swept across us.
He put his hand on my back to reassure me, and we watched as a train rumbled across the bridge just north of us, crashing and banging as it went.
I hoped that all trains weren’t that loud. The one I’d followed in the air hadn’t been, but maybe I wasn’t close enough to hear it that well. Maybe it was that loud up close.
When we finally got back to campus, I walked with him to Winston and gave him a kiss, and then he drove off for his home. As much as I wanted to spend the night with him, I’d have to be up early for final exams . . . even earlier than I’d thought, because of Daylight Saving Time.
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January 22, 2009: It was -22F. I had a flat tire. In a mild blessing, my truck was in the parking garage out of the wind and snow because I hadn't won the lottery for a closer parking spot.
Also, urbanex? I'm down.
Man I was a wreck around exam time. Still am. Paranoid about waking up early enough
Ah, the stupidity of daylight savings time. Australia crosses three time zones, and for half the year that is further divided into five distinct time zones, thanks to our stupid State Governments. Don't even get me started on the fact that we have three rail gauges in operation. It's nothing short of a miricale that the whole country drives on the same side of the road...
Poor misunderstood daylight saving
Na! It's useless!
Why the bold characters?
7197307
I marked it on the draft so I'd remember to check if I'd introduced her before. Then I forgot to unmark it.
7197300 Not bad
But there is worst in South America and Himalaya.
The simple way to describe Daylight Savings Time is for Silver Glow to observe the sunrise and sunset at the end of June, then have her consider how people would use the light if the sun rose and set an hour earlier. More people would use the hour of light from 9:00 to 10:00 PM than 5:00 to 6:00 AM, and that will be especially clear if she participates in some Michigan summer outdoor activities.
I live at about 65° north, the concept of daylight savings time seems like a futile effort to me.
7197380
One has to consider the context, she probably finds it extra weird being from a place where the ruler can just decide the sunlight hours, manually.
Daylight Savings Time is a wonderful creation if you enjoy the sun at 8pm instead of 4am.
DST is dumb in this age.
I love the relationship between Silver and Aric, it's just right.
You passed a hundred thousand words Hella quick and I didn't get a chance to notice and say congrats!
7197290
You live where the story takes place? !
Awesome
"Study break". So that's what they're calling it now.
7193798
How fortunate you said this, because it turns out you didn't begin. You literally have not said anything which disproved the model, which only exists to demonstrate how money paid to a worker under wage-labour does not directly correspond to the value they create with their labour. The worker in this demonstration model could go on a go-slow, or decide to speed himself up, and the wage would not be in the slightest bit affected by the increase or decrease in the profitability of his labour for his employer. This is because his labour is sold by the hour, not by what is achieved in the hour.
This is something which, in your rambling, you proved for me. Your story about your grandfather and his coworkers still getting paid despite there being no actual profitability in the work they were performing? This is that in effect.
s32.postimg.org/65cixdwg3/giphy.gif
Hell, it even applies to the most common form of non-wage labour, the salary; because it is the nature of paying a fixed price for human labour when the results of that labour cannot be fixed.
7197543 Yeah, I ain't got the answers either. Thanks for helping me think through the questions though!
7197868 Personally I am quite down with socialism and would love it if we ended up living in a socialist paradise. And while it isn't inevitable, I think it's possible; you're right that conditions are changing. In particular the need for human labor is changing significantly even as overall wealth is raising to the point where keeping everyone alive and fit is becoming comparatively cheaper and cheaper, which is potentially favorable for socialism. (Or other thing I'd like less, but you know.)
But while that hypothetical society would owe a great deal to Marx, I don't believe it would be much like communism as he wrote about it. The intensity of high-level control in his system is IMO basically just pointless. Markets are great for letting people allocate their resources based on their own individual quirks and desires, and some number of people do really get a lot of satisfaction from feeling economically successful. It's difficult for me to say they need to be removed from the picture rather than just moderated, something that's in line with a lot of modern socialisms. I'd say something like the universal living wage and associated policies are at least as much an indication of where a future high on the socialism scale might end up as Marx's communism. Certainly I think it'd be a better one.
That's sort of why I closed as I did: that whole line of thought owes a huge philosophical debt to Marx, but it's also been modified over the intervening years pretty significantly.
Ah, my old nemesis, Daylight Saving Time! You just get past the part of the year that has you squinting into the sun during your commute, and then the clock is reset and you're right back in it again.
Supposedly, people use less electrical energy due to DST. I'm skeptical, but have no proof they're wrong--but I also suspect it causes more traffic accidents each year.
<Oh, I could have fun with that idea.) 
<Please. Just, no.)
I never saw the point if daylight savings time. I think it's tally stupid.
7198041
Sometimes, there's a walkway laid down just for that purpose, and sometimes, workers on the roof are expected to wear special shoes. Also, maintenance can watch for leaks for a little while after they've been up there. Of course, some roofs don't have the problem, and are capable of withstanding normal foot traffic. Most people can't tell by looking--even I can't, I just know that for some common roof systems the manufacturer warranty severely limits foot traffic.
The possibility of doing tens of thousands of dollars of damage should be enough to keep people from trespassing on roofs they don't own, but hey, college students. You've also touched on another problem, with Silver Glow talking about the smell from glove box outlets on the roof of the chemistry building. Some of those won't just smell bad; they'll straight-up kill you. They're on the roof because the effluent will be diluted enough by atmospheric action before reaching areas where people are expected to be. Workers servicing the roof will take the glove boxes out of service before going up there.
I suspect that it won't take long after her being noticed on a roof for maintenance to talk to the administration, and Silver Glow getting a call from the Dean of Students.
7197563 oh dear god, I didn't even think of bio labs. Same with chem labs.
yeah daylight saving is the worst!
all the time and trouble that could be saved without it.
7197908
"Allocating their resources" for their own individual quirks and desires means buying themselves things with their money, which is a thing people also do in planned economies. You don't need "Markets" for that at all.
But when you bring market economics into it then the law of value must be obeyed. What you do must be financially viable.
This is inherently contradictory with socialism, because satisfying everyone's needs is a money loser. Look at some of the social benefits a Soviet citizen enjoyed: Rent and utilities could not be charged more than 5% of income by law, unlimited free childcare, unlimited free healthcare, retirement at 60, and they did not pay tax.
They could do this only with planned economics. If the USSR operated as a market then all of those things would have bankrupted them immediately.
What is important to recognize when it comes to resource allocation is that every capitalist firm practices planned economics on an internal basis. In a business like Walmart they actually do it much more than the entire soviet union ever could.
If you buy something at Walmart the barcode is scanned, a record of the purchase is made on their computer system immediately, which then deducts the item from the number in stock. This data shows everything, it can tell you what time of day, month or year an item best sells, the regions in which it best sells, how price changes correspond to changes in its popularity, everything. This system can then be used to set up any given stores' next order of stock from the warehouse.
This is a very advanced form of economic planning, what the soviets referred to as cybernetic economics. They correctly predicted this would exist, but the USSR did not live long enough for the technology to come about. What eventually lead to disaster in the Soviet planned economy was that it grew far faster than the technology they needed to plan it with. By the 80s they were attempting the correct and timely assigning of resources to the production of 25 million different consumer products, with nothing but pens, paper and a smattering of punch card machines to work it out with. The largest country on earth died under a pile of paperwork.
7198010 One of my teacher in coaching class said something about alcohol that can apply here:
"As long as you don't abuse, if it help you being mentally ready for the race, go ahead."
7198121
Agreed! That stuff is so nasty!
Tried it once, someone paid a round of shooter, and then a few more. I followed, 'cause (bad) reason, but I really hated the experience...
7198139 I can definitely see that attitude being predominant in Ponyville, it's just that in Equestria as a whole, we basically have a large statistical sample present of who ponies prefer as their leader, and its split among the tribes and genders pretty evenly. Maybe ponies prefer one thing, but Celestia uses a quota system to appoint the leaders of various cities?
7198364 You don't know who Alton Brown is? Look on YouTube or Netflix for 'Good Eats' & 'Cutthroat Kitchen'
Of all the chefs on Food Network, Alton is the most likely to attempt a show about making Equestrian recipes work on Earth. At least until such time as Food Network could hire an Equestrian chef.
7198482 I wasn't thinking of merely the father, but more about the whole family. The other adult depending of who she is hanging with.
Daylight Savings Time has its good points and its bad points. I've grown up with it most of my life, so when I moved to Guam for three years it was weird that the region was south far enough that they never lost more than 15 minutes of daylight. It was always dark around 1930. That took some adjusting when I visited the states for vacation during the summer.
7197834
You are correct. Velvet Touch is still a new enough story that if it gets an update and enough people read it, it's actually able to climb back into the 'new stories' section of the feature box.
I'd never seen that happen before until now, though.
7197613
That's a neat idea, the potential for protagonist/antagonist role reversal within essentially the same story told from different cultural perspectives is a pretty interesting scenario. That's almost deserving of a story on its own.
There certainly must be parallels to this concept in human culture as well, especially relating to military conflicts that have transpired.
Oohh I also witnessed this duality in the James Cameron movie- Avatar.
The character of Colonel Miles Quaritch, to the Na'Vi, would be considered a conquering destroyer of monstrous magnitude; while to the humans, he may be considered a war hero and a hero to the species in general for his role in obtaining the rare ore at the nexxus of the conflict. To Quaritch, he's simply a man doing his job.
Um yeah... Contrary to David's 'opinions', that's too dangerous to do all year round.
These places are NOT designed for people to wonder about in, are riddled with non intuitive dangers, contain none of the safety features we take for granted at ground level, and you are completely screwed if anything goes wrong.
Listen to your instincts on this one Silver.
Immanuel Kant was a real piss-ant who could drink you under the table~.
I've got teachers in my family as well. They've made public schools sound like a war torn country. My respect for them are high.
derpicdn.net/img/view/2013/3/13/269739__safe_scootaloo_sweetie+belle_apple+bloom_glasses_cutie+mark+crusaders_diamond+tiara_cheerilee_angry_silver+spoon.png
7198864 Wasn't Kant the guy that started or gave the idea to start Post-Modernism or was that someone else?
7198121
several people have told me that
7198205
Neither does Marx, who was a German. Kipling can get bitter and sarcastic at times, especially when regarding the lot of British troopers in the 1880s; the best example of this I can think of was Tommy. Personally, I grew up reading his book of short stories The Just-So Stories; I think I still have it somewhere in storage.
For a uniquely American poet with a snarky edge to her verse, I heartily recommend Dorothy Parker.
Come to think of it, I imagine Oatmeal Stouts would be a big hit in Equestria.
derpicdn.net/img/2013/4/5/288728/full.png
We need a chapter where they take Silver out, get plastered and teach her some old traditional songs to bring back home with her. Does Kalamazoo College have a decent choir or glee club?
I believe people posted the Philosopher's Drinking Song earlier, so I won't repeat it.
farm9.staticflickr.com/8305/7967647002_a92733967e_o.gif
7199070 One crazy thing I've found while rummaging through the webs is a poem that's often attributed to him, but it's not and seems to only be regurgitated by some Right wing sites. I've tried searching through Kipling's entire collection of poetry and there wasn't a match.
Wrath of the Awakened Saxon by "Rudyard Kipling" (Actually from some Anonymous person)
Well, the trip to the NWS was a delight. I wonder what they'll make of the data.
As for this entry, it's a shame that Silver associates Walgreens with that jerk. Still, at least she feels prepared for her exams. Hopefully, she really is. I know what it's like to have pre-test confidence crumble upon looking at it.
Also, I do have to love how Silver equates "philosophy I don't like" with "objectively wrong." We all do to a certain extent, but it's so refreshing to see someone be up front about it.
7199089 thanks for the advice. So far i've found that I don't like super hoppy beers. I'm fine with a bit of bitter but from what i've had so far, it's easy for it to overpower the other flavors. I haven't had much hard stuff, but I think i'd like it more than other types of drinks. I'ts going to be slow process for me though. I'm the only person who's 21 in my small circle of friends so I can't really go out drinking with friends plus i'm technically supposed to have alcohol in my apartment (i live on campus), it doesn't stop me, but it isn't really worth pushing it to me.
7198534 In discussions on the value of the tools and the values of the skills and knowledge of the laborer, may also forget that in modern companies that the CEO and President are also a form of laborer and they have knowledge and skills that also need to be given a value. In publicly traded companies it is a board of directors that govern things, not the CEO.
It is unfair how the CEO has unfettered access to the board of directors and can argue his case for higher pay while the average line worker cannot, but both are still in a way employees to the 'Company'. It is the company that ultimately owns both, and not I do not agree that this now means that the company is now a person and deserves rights such as in citizens united. Just that when Marx wrote his philosophy businesses themselves were individually owned and the boss could determine his own wage and usually had a monopoly in his field of business so never had to worry about competition and thus could just sit back and collect money and do no work.
Modern businesses are not like that anymore, the entire model has shifted. Look at when JC Penny got in a new CEO, that vice pres from Apple. He brought in his own knowledge and skills, reduced prices on all goods in the store, and tried to make a more 'hip' environment for new consumers. But while this worked for Apple, at JC Penny this completely alienated the older regular shoppers, failed to bring in new shoppers, the staff he brought in regularly ridiculed and made fun of the old JC Penny staff as 'dinosaurs' and drove an already failing company further into the ground. The next CEO brought in undid a lot of the damage and is now trying to bring the company back and reassure the older shoppers and did a lot to help the company.
So as a boss, both CEO's do work that affects the company. Their actions have immediate and massive effects on the business and their skills and knowledge can impact the future of the business. So what is the value of that skill and knowledge? If the entire fate of a business is reliant upon the business contracts and marketing and culture the CEO creates, how much is that worth?
If you can only attract that kind of talent by offering millions because all your competitors are doing the same and now exorbitant CEO pay is dictated by the market and not by a lone individual. And adjusted by a board of directors, who take comments from the share holders, who in turn are looking at the market, which is regulated by governments, which in turn is influenced by global stability and instability and foreign trade.... Then the simplistic Marx view of a single 'BOSS' who controls everything and exploits the skills of workers while providing no skills or knowledge himself begins to look obsolete.
If you do find a company like that then yes, to hell with the boss, but otherwise, we need a new philosopher to make sense of the new modern global business. Let me know who the new guy or girl is. We're long over due for one now.
7199249 Coincidentaly, there was a specialist talking about this at the radio yesterday morning.
I didn't note down everything he said, but I do remember a few things.
At some point, these guy are starting to ask for higher salary on the ground that some other guy in some other company in the same domain is having an higher salary, then there is stuff like the stock option (basically letting them buy part for very lowered prices), a couple instance of conflict of interest (the people choosing the exec salary got their job thank to the exec) and so on.
Everywhere, both companies and government are asking the "regular" people to accept cut, austerity politics and such.
At the same time, the average salary for the higher-end management increased by 73% percent last year.
Yeah, I get it, they have a pressure of some sort, but there is just compensation and indecent salary. We are way past the point where it is indecent.
7199273
Okay. Try mild, fruity pilsners and hefeweizens, then.
7199327 granted i've only had 5 different types of beer so I don't have a lot of reference points. An IPA, a wheat beer, an amber ale (Fat Tire), a local microbrew that was fairly hoppy, though less so than IPA, and something that i'm not sure what it was. It wasn't overwhelmingly bitter, but it was the only flavor present. the ale was my favorite, followed by the wheat beer. IPA was the worst.
7199348
Yeah. There's only 1 IPA that I've ever really liked (Surly Overrated), and that was only after I'd tried it with a dogfish glass.
beerpulse.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/02/riedel-glass1.jpg
7199229
That's a compound curve. Like I said, once you've driven on one--going from the big radius to the small one--you understand why we don't build those anymore.
7199348
7199364 Got advice for a tasteful light alcohol beverage? I've tried flavored Smirnoff and couldn't get more than a bottle and a half over an hour or two before painful stomach cramps kicked in like a mule.
7199365 Some people see that and go, hell no. Others see it as a challenge.
7199364 i'm to broke and don't have the expertise for glasses lol.
7199381 don't have much experience, but i've liked mixed stuff. Cuba Libre, Mojito, Long Island Iced tea, stuff like that.
7196506
7198228
A beer after a workout is quite healthy for easing aches, adding vitamins and minerals and serving as a reward if you're the type who needs incentive to drag yourself to the gym with any regularity.
Of course, if you are the undisciplined type, drinking at all is probably a bad idea.
7199381
Light as in few calories? Or coloration?
For pale stuff, Leinenkugel's signature lager is okay for the price, though in my opinion, once you've had one American Lager, you've had them all.
Also, I developed a taste for shandy when I was living with family in Dublin. Many Americans undoubtedly look down on it as a girly drink, but give Leinie's different varieties a try. Now that summer is coming, seasonal shandys are being released and you can find bulk cases at Costco.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2014/07/11/shandy-best-taste-test_n_5548078.html
7197290
I had to do that once when it was well below zero. I'd just gotten out of the shower, too, and my hair froze while I was changing the tire.
7197292
I know. When I go to bed late, I leave the lights on so that I won't oversleep.
7197303
We used to have two, but then we changed all the ones in the South in one very busy week. Also, I think it was Sweden which changed what side of the road they drove on one day.
7197380
She's a morning pony, though, so taking away an hour of her morning light isn't much of a benefit to her.
7197394
When I was in Edmonton last May, it was still light out at ten PM. Not sure if Canada has DST; I was already confused by the changes in time zones.
She's already observed how few people are morning people. For now, her experiences with being active in the evening are indoors. When she's participating in some activity outside one that can't be done in darkness, she'll probably see why DST is a thing.