Re: Guest Post: Gwyneth Paltow's guest house

1

It's worth keeping in mind that whatever the speaker intended, other people can turn it into a euphemism.


Posted by: Moby Hick | Link to this comment | 08-22-23 6:11 AM
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I thought it would have something to do with inserting healing objects in her vagina. I was excited to get to "2 centimeters of free Goop products" but was ultimately disappointed.


Posted by: SP | Link to this comment | 08-22-23 6:22 AM
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Inserting items in her guest house. Do keep up.


Posted by: heebie-geebie | Link to this comment | 08-22-23 6:24 AM
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Technically, she's a nepo baby, but she's so much more famous than her parents that it seems incorrect.


Posted by: Moby Hick | Link to this comment | 08-22-23 6:26 AM
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3 They gotta get that scent on those candles somehow


Posted by: Barry Freed | Link to this comment | 08-22-23 6:28 AM
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Or maybe that's just my age. My dad always saw Carrie Fischer as the kid of Eddie Fischer (who I wouldn't even remember except for Carrie and Elizabeth Taylor) and Debbie Reynolds.


Posted by: Moby Hick | Link to this comment | 08-22-23 6:28 AM
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I somehow only realized over this summer that my dad's cousin is married to GP's cousin.


Posted by: LBJ | Link to this comment | 08-22-23 6:29 AM
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Dad's other cousin. I should say that these are step-cousins he acquired in college, so he didn't grow up with them. But it is quite a well-connected family.


Posted by: LBJ | Link to this comment | 08-22-23 6:33 AM
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He should try renting out his house.


Posted by: Moby Hick | Link to this comment | 08-22-23 6:34 AM
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Anyway, I've come to the conclusion that the gig economy and things like Airbnb are basically tax evasion and insurance fraud where successful and defrauding people bad at assessing risk where not.


Posted by: Moby Hick | Link to this comment | 08-22-23 6:54 AM
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Which I guess is why hiring Paltrow makes sense.


Posted by: Moby Hick | Link to this comment | 08-22-23 7:23 AM
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That's kinda true, but also kinda not. For example, Airbnb's that are tiny homes on some locals' property in a rural tourist area don't obviously fit into either category. They're a way to get around building restrictions that stop hotels from being built for sure, but they can absolutely be profitable even if you're charged taxes and proper insurance.

I completely agree that Uber has that problem. Airbnb I think only sometimes does.


Posted by: Unfoggetarian: “Pause endlessly, then go in” (9) | Link to this comment | 08-22-23 7:26 AM
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The thing about Uber is that I remember what the taxi was like here before Uber and Uber is still better.


Posted by: Moby Hick | Link to this comment | 08-22-23 7:28 AM
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But if Airbnb was really useful and going to be a continuing part of a good economy, they would have hired Taylor Swift.


Posted by: Moby Hick | Link to this comment | 08-22-23 7:29 AM
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It may not be too late to but her Cornelia Street apartment and turn it into a Taylor-themed AirBnB. If you have $18m.

https://www.businessinsider.com/taylor-swift-cornelia-street-song-nyc-rental-apartment-photos-2019-8?amp


Posted by: Unfoggetarian: “Pause endlessly, then go in” (9) | Link to this comment | 08-22-23 7:40 AM
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As it happens, I don't have $18 million.


Posted by: Moby Hick | Link to this comment | 08-22-23 7:42 AM
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My health insurance company is offering me up to $200 if I get an online coach from them. Maybe they will let me have 90,000 coaches? Personally, I think they just want to be reassured that I'm taking my blood pressure medication.


Posted by: Moby Hick | Link to this comment | 08-22-23 7:48 AM
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We made a lot of money from Airbnb the year we lived abroad- maybe $60k gross? It didn't take any housing off the market because I was coming back occasionally and we were only gone 8 months so there was no long term rental possibility. We kept it up for a couple more years doing high demand weekends at $1000 a night (sporting events, graduations) but it's a pain to move personal stuff out of the way so we stopped.


Posted by: SP | Link to this comment | 08-22-23 7:57 AM
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you know you'll get old and the ways of the youth will seem unfamiliar and fraught

This happened to me a few years ago. I feel like I'm mostly spectating another generation's world these days.


Posted by: ogged | Link to this comment | 08-22-23 7:57 AM
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It still seems like everyone older than me is the problem. That and having to piss six times before lunch because of blood pressure medication and coffee.


Posted by: Moby Hick | Link to this comment | 08-22-23 7:59 AM
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$1000 a night

What do you have, a grotto?


Posted by: ogged | Link to this comment | 08-22-23 8:00 AM
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Yeah, sometimes I think about doing that for graduation, but as you say cleaning up is a big pain.


Posted by: Unfoggetarian: "Pause endlessly, then go in" (9) | Link to this comment | 08-22-23 8:02 AM
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Surely you can just hose it off?


Posted by: mc | Link to this comment | 08-22-23 8:03 AM
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everyone older than me is the problem

This is the case, but everyone younger is kinda weird.


Posted by: ogged | Link to this comment | 08-22-23 8:04 AM
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Yes. I can live with that though.


Posted by: Moby Hick | Link to this comment | 08-22-23 8:05 AM
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Something better than sex, within walking distance of Harvard.


Posted by: SP | Link to this comment | 08-22-23 8:06 AM
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Everything is within walking distance of Harvard if you have enough time.


Posted by: Moby Hick | Link to this comment | 08-22-23 8:07 AM
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Hey now


Posted by: Opinionated Steven Wright | Link to this comment | 08-22-23 8:08 AM
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Yes. That's where I stole it.


Posted by: Moby Hick | Link to this comment | 08-22-23 8:11 AM
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Everything is within walking distance of Harvard if you have enough time.

the sea tho


Posted by: ajay | Link to this comment | 08-22-23 8:25 AM
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Continental drift.


Posted by: Moby Hick | Link to this comment | 08-22-23 8:35 AM
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28: HEY NOW!


Posted by: OPINIONATED HANK KINGSLEY | Link to this comment | 08-22-23 8:47 AM
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You're an all-star!


Posted by: Opinionated Smash Mouth | Link to this comment | 08-22-23 8:53 AM
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31: Harvard Welcomes the Inaugural All-Pedestrian Class of 250000023!


Posted by: ajay | Link to this comment | 08-22-23 8:54 AM
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The AI Paltrow replacement will be even worse. Influencers will be the first to have their income eaten by AI.

I have a theoretical idea I'd like to try-- as I get older like everyone above, I've come to appreciate how the past is another country. So my idea is to use this common sentiment, which presumably is shared by Trumpies and their fellow-travelers at the periphery of my social life, to plant a germ of sympathy for actual immigrants. The same dislocation and discomfort that comes from looking at weirdos older and younger, that feeling is something we all share with geographical immigrants.


Posted by: lw | Link to this comment | 08-22-23 9:20 AM
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Influencers will be the first to have their income eaten by AI.

Not enough AI fake fans spending money or too many AI fake influencers?


Posted by: fake accent | Link to this comment | 08-22-23 9:34 AM
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The AI influencers are the real ones, the opportunistic teens and worse adults who don't really mean what they say about skincare or nutrition, those are the fakes.

Logan Paul bragged about walking out of Oppenheimer after explaining that human speech is incomprehensible to him.


Posted by: lw | Link to this comment | 08-22-23 9:39 AM
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That is, Logan Paul shows that it's possible for humans to adapt even more effectively than Paltrow or the Kardashians have done, we may be able to compete with AI after all.


Posted by: lw | Link to this comment | 08-22-23 9:42 AM
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I know that AI can copy Paltrow's nipples barely covered by a thin top, but where's the heart?


Posted by: Moby Hick | Link to this comment | 08-22-23 9:51 AM
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Does anyone else have the problem that Facebook is now often mostly AI generated soft core porn?


Posted by: Unfoggetarian: “Pause endlessly, then go in” (9) | Link to this comment | 08-22-23 9:57 AM
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No. I get guns and old people stuff.


Posted by: Moby Hick | Link to this comment | 08-22-23 9:58 AM
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42

Not old-people porn. Just like "Aren't you great because you can dial a rotary phone".


Posted by: Moby Hick | Link to this comment | 08-22-23 10:00 AM
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I am very interested to know whether the ad feed algorithm responds to spoken words heard by a telephone-- I mentioned peaches yesterday, looked at fb two hours later and there's the ad. There have been a few other instances where something spoken but not typed or in the stream of pages I've looked at appears. Definitely aggregated by IP though, so also need to include activity of other household members. This is one of those questions that the internet isn't all that helpful for-- there's basically a Google platform, a competing Meta platform. Are there others? Is Thiel allied with either of these?

Farmers market peaches are out of this world delicious right now, btw.


Posted by: lw | Link to this comment | 08-22-23 10:06 AM
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44

That's a euphemism.


Posted by: Moby Hick | Link to this comment | 08-22-23 10:07 AM
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45

https://miscenscene.com/

Holzer v Paltrow


Posted by: lw | Link to this comment | 08-22-23 10:32 AM
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46

Aren't you great because you can dial a rotary phone

That's a euphemism

You know how to dial, don't you? You just put your finger in the hole, and make tiny little circles.


Posted by: lauren bacall me, maybe | Link to this comment | 08-22-23 12:12 PM
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47

46 is great.


Posted by: peep | Link to this comment | 08-22-23 1:01 PM
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48

Gen Z are more about making letters with their fingers.


Posted by: Minivet | Link to this comment | 08-22-23 1:38 PM
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49

"O" is a letter.


Posted by: Moby Hick | Link to this comment | 08-22-23 1:40 PM
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Gwyneth Paltrow's Montecito neighbors piled a bunch of rocks to prevent people from parking by a trailhead, then sued under CEQA when the county tried to remove them. (It took a while, but it looks like they're losing hard enough they will have to pay the county for legal fees.)


Posted by: Minivet | Link to this comment | 08-22-23 1:58 PM
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"To establish China's dominant position in the international discourse related to Tibet, there is an urgent need for an English translation of 'Tibet' that can accurately describe China's position," Wang Linping, a professor at Harbin Engineering University's College of Marxism, was quoted as saying. He claimed the use of the name Tibet had "seriously misled the international community" over the "geographical scope" of the region. Wang said the region should instead be referred to as Xizang - the pinyin, or Chinese romanisation of Mandarin script for Tibet.


Posted by: mc | Link to this comment | 08-22-23 1:58 PM
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the region ... referred to as Xizang

Now that's how you euphemize.


Posted by: Doug | Link to this comment | 08-22-23 2:45 PM
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53

I keep hearing about the Youf Em Asia.


Posted by: heebie | Link to this comment | 08-22-23 3:07 PM
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||

Bleg: I have followed a couple of bloggers to substack. When notes opened up I've spent some time there commenting on people's notes.

A week ago I was contacted by a substack PR person to say, "in addition to authors we've wanted to highlight some of the readers, and we've noticed that you've been engaging and leaving useful comments. Could I send you a couple of interview questions over e-mail?"

I was flattered, it's so unusual for me to be an early adopter, and I said yes. We've had a back-and-forth and it's moving forward.

Two questions for the group here:

1) Is it better if I do or do not try to mention unfogged as my "home-blog" in my capsule description of myself?

2) They asked if I was comfortable sharing my last name. It's clearly a substack thing -- they obviously encourage their authors to use their real names. I don't mind; I don't think there's much risk, but I have a long acquired habit of preferring pseudo-anonymity. How cautious should I be?

|>


Posted by: NickS | Link to this comment | 08-22-23 4:24 PM
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This is the kind of thing I would also stress out about.


Posted by: heebie | Link to this comment | 08-22-23 4:42 PM
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Tell them your real name is Wry Cooter.


Posted by: Moby Hick | Link to this comment | 08-22-23 4:48 PM
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It's silly; it's fun, but I doubt more than a couple dozen people will read it and care, so I shouldn't stress out about it. But I am curious if anyone has an opinion.


Posted by: NickS | Link to this comment | 08-22-23 4:53 PM
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the one thing that I am excited about. They asked for a photo; I said "no" they then offered that if I submitted a photo they would turn it into a stylized illustration (like the one here). That is too good to pass up.


Posted by: NickS | Link to this comment | 08-22-23 4:55 PM
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Mentioning Unfogged is fine unless someone pipes up and says they're uncomfortable with it.


Posted by: LizardBreath | Link to this comment | 08-22-23 4:59 PM
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It's probably read, stalking.


Posted by: Moby Hick | Link to this comment | 08-22-23 5:03 PM
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Ha, it doesn't matter, because they're not going to mention some non-substack blog to their audience.


Posted by: ogged | Link to this comment | 08-22-23 5:06 PM
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This place was never monetized, probably because Standpipe was in charge at the crucial time.


Posted by: Moby Hick | Link to this comment | 08-22-23 5:20 PM
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Could have probably made at least twice what Crooked Timber does.


Posted by: Moby Hick | Link to this comment | 08-22-23 5:28 PM
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61: we'll see. I think the cynicism is warranted.


Posted by: NickS | Link to this comment | 08-22-23 5:35 PM
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I got a notification that someone followed me on Substack. I was puzzled.


Posted by: peep | Link to this comment | 08-22-23 5:38 PM
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I spent some of this afternoon reading about the various names of Tibet. I wonder if we should start saying Böd to get under Zhongnanhai's skin. But possibly that has more specific and/or ethnic connotations for Tibetans, like using Myanmar instead of Burma apparently does there.


Posted by: Minivet | Link to this comment | 08-22-23 6:06 PM
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Who will write the "Welcome Substack Readers!" post?


Posted by: fake accent | Link to this comment | 08-22-23 6:54 PM
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But to be earnest, I would be wary of the fans of some of Substack's most prominent writers.


Posted by: fake accent | Link to this comment | 08-22-23 6:55 PM
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I am unsure what direction substack will head, but without Notes I wouldn't have noticed that Sherman Alexie has a substack, and it's really good. For example: https://shermanalexie.substack.com/p/my-fathers-novel


Posted by: NickS | Link to this comment | 08-22-23 7:31 PM
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I would mind.


Posted by: mc | Link to this comment | 08-22-23 8:40 PM
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"According to the results of preliminary analysis, due to the deviation of the actual parameters of the impulse from the calculated ones, the Luna-25 spacecraft moved to a non-calculated orbit," Roscosmos said in a statement. It then "ceased to exist as a result of collision with the surface of the moon."


Posted by: mc | Link to this comment | 08-22-23 8:49 PM
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country's first Moon mission since 1976, when the Soviet Union launched the Luna-24. That robot lander successfully returned to Earth carrying lunar soil samples for scientists to study. In the Luna-25 mission, Russia was racing to beat India, whose Chandrayaan-3 spacecraft is approaching the Moon's South Pole region and is scheduled to make its landing on Wednesday.


Posted by: mc | Link to this comment | 08-22-23 8:52 PM
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|| speaking of nepo babies and prominent substack writers, whoever here said MY was on a GG trajectory, your comment is aging well so far |>


Posted by: Todd | Link to this comment | 08-22-23 9:11 PM
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70: understood.


Posted by: NickS | Link to this comment | 08-22-23 9:27 PM
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74: appreciated.


Posted by: mc | Link to this comment | 08-22-23 9:40 PM
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76

50 reminds me of what seems to be a comically obvious attempt at arson fraud or possibly the lead in to a BBC murder mystery, or, I feel legally obliged to state, perhaps just a completely innocent sequence of coincidences:

There is or rather was a famous pub in Lancashire called the Crooked House, which subsided partly about 200 years ago and as a result was crooked. Doors and windows at an angle, sloping floor. All very entertaining, perfectly structurally sound, and legally protected for reasons of age and quirkiness. It closed recently and, despite attempts to keep it as a pub, this local couple bought it.

And: it turns out they also own the quarry/landfill immediately adjoining the land on which the pub is built.

And: less than a week after they bought it, the pub mysteriously burned.

And: it burned so completely because there was a mysterious six-foot pile of earth and gravel blocking the access road so the fire engines couldn't get to the pub, almost as if... as if it had been placed there deliberately to prevent the fire brigade reaching the fire by someone with both
a) a motive to destroy the pub, such as, to pick a hypothetical motive at random, wishing to expand one's nearby quarry/landfill site on to the land the pub occupied;
and
b) access to a large JCB digger.

And: two days after it burned, the owners sent, of all things, a large JCB digger to flatten what was left of the pub, without permission.

And: it turned out that they had hired, in a twist that I'm sure has left everyone reading this utterly taken aback, a large JCB digger from a nearby plant hire company shortly before the fire.

And: this isn't the first mysterious fire that's happened on a property that this couple owned.

And: the police are treating the fire as arson.

And: despite the fact that the pub's remains are now a crime scene, the couple have sent contractors to remove as much of the debris (or, as a lawyer would call it, evidence) as possible - they have been prevented from doing so.


Posted by: ajay | Link to this comment | 08-23-23 12:38 AM
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"The truth is, these are not very bright guys, and things got out of hand."


Posted by: Posthumously Opinionated Mark Felt | Link to this comment | 08-23-23 1:18 AM
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I think "destruction by fire of a classic English real ale pub" is the sort of scenario where even Inspector Morse might find himself indulging in a bit of police brutality.


Posted by: ajay | Link to this comment | 08-23-23 1:48 AM
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76 that's outrageous


Posted by: Barry Freed | Link to this comment | 08-23-23 2:26 AM
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Well look, you straight up name the place "crooked" you shouldn't act all surprised when people take you at your word.


Posted by: mc | Link to this comment | 08-23-23 3:36 AM
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Ah but 4b contradicts 6. Did they own a digger because they have a quarry, or did they have to rent one? If the digger was rented, the crime was invented!


Posted by: SP | Link to this comment | 08-23-23 4:05 AM
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The quarry rented diggers regularly. There's a Wikipedia page. But it was in Staffordshire.


Posted by: Moby Hick | Link to this comment | 08-23-23 5:05 AM
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I just read that the U.K. is poorer than Mississippi if you adjust for purchasing power. They probably can't afford every business to have their own digger, even if the business of the business is digging.


Posted by: Moby Hick | Link to this comment | 08-23-23 5:11 AM
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Yeah but where would you rather live?


Posted by: Barry Freed | Link to this comment | 08-23-23 5:18 AM
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Pittsburgh.


Posted by: Moby Hick | Link to this comment | 08-23-23 5:24 AM
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Of the two, the U.K. But the real question is which one would I rather commit arson in.


Posted by: Moby Hick | Link to this comment | 08-23-23 5:26 AM
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In the UK you can't even afford a house to commit arson in.


Posted by: Mossy Character | Link to this comment | 08-23-23 5:35 AM
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That's why you burn closed pubs.


Posted by: Moby Hick | Link to this comment | 08-23-23 5:35 AM
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And why Gwyneth Paltrow had to move back to Los Angeles and put her house on Airbnb.


Posted by: Moby Hick | Link to this comment | 08-23-23 5:43 AM
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I just read that the U.K. is poorer than Mississippi if you adjust for purchasing power.

Ah, another Spectator reader!

Apparently this is not the case - the editor of the Spectator is of course an innumerate fascist - but the UK without London would be very slightly poorer per head, in PPP terms, than Mississippi.
https://www.ft.com/content/e5c741a7-befa-4d49-a819-f1b0510a9802

(Related, from the same author: https://www.ft.com/content/653bbb26-8a22-4db3-b43d-c34a0b774303)


Posted by: ajay | Link to this comment | 08-23-23 5:59 AM
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I saw it in The Atlantic, but I didn't read the article.


Posted by: Moby Hick | Link to this comment | 08-23-23 6:02 AM
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Instead of "writing this sort of rubbish will get you thrown in the sea", why not try "this is a strikingly novel thesis and you deserve to be in The Atlantic"?


Posted by: ajay | Link to this comment | 08-23-23 6:05 AM
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We have a crooked pub in Oakland! Specifically a tiny saloon near the estuary from 1884, survived probably because of its close association with patron Jack London.


Posted by: Minivet | Link to this comment | 08-23-23 7:19 AM
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Jack London had his house burn down instead of a pub, because he was rich by then.


Posted by: Moby Hick | Link to this comment | 08-23-23 7:21 AM
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something something diggers and levellers something


Posted by: fake accent | Link to this comment | 08-23-23 7:58 AM
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Why doesn't this blog cover the real issue of our day, which is how "cancel culture" woke academics are the real fascists?


Posted by: Opinionated Bari Weiss's Substack Readers | Link to this comment | 08-23-23 12:30 PM
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Re 76: They arrested two people for arson. One was from Milton Keynes, suggesting economic factors played a role.


Posted by: Moby Hick | Link to this comment | 08-24-23 11:21 AM
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