PS: Haha, pretty fun, RC. Of all places, I recently got a customer service girl who was in Uruguay. I may have to call there again just to ask how the place is as a bug-out location. "What, bug-out? Do you still have a bug, Sir?"

Her accent was thicker than most, but once she told me she was in Uruguay (after I asked), I had a soft spot for her. She was pretty sharp too.

PS I like to tell the Indians on the other end, “hey let’s talk some smack about the Pakistanis” and then proceed to do so. I’ve had them laughing out loud.

Or ask them for restaurant recommendations in Hyderabad and invite them for lunch on Tuesday.

PS

Tucker Carlson had defied the Fox News "cease-and-desist" court-filing by releasing a monologue tonight:

(14 minutes)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wYerCQEsLLw

Tucker reveals that Fox News immediately fired a producer who had put the phrase "Wannabe dictator" as a heading for Biden on the screen, the evening of the Trump arrest.

Then Tucker says Biden is not a wannabe dictator and lists the reasons why.

PS: A couple more links...

https://ruwix.com/the-rubiks-cube/rubiks-cube-patterns-algorithms/
https://tinyurl.com/3bed63sk

☮

PS You mod, You insulted black names. That’s even worse than wanting to touch a black woman’s hair.

PS: Greetings, Achmed,

It's pretty cool that your kid can solve the cube in under a minute, and that he's tried (learned?) some of the more difficult cubes and other puzzles*.

This is the video I watched to learn the cube...
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7Ron6MN45LY

He doesn't do the daisy, which I learned somewhere else. (I think the daisy makes it a bit easier/quicker to make the white cross.) Then as you say, finish the white side and the first row. (Sometimes I'll start with a different color than the white face just for fun which really makes it more difficult and slows my time down quite a bit because I'm just not used to working the colors that way.) Then it's on to the side pieces of the second row, then the yellow cross on top, then putting the blue, green, orange and red side pieces in their proper places, then getting the corners in the right place and finally putting the corners in the right direction to complete the yellow face.

I'm not very competitive, so it's highly unlikely that I'll be breaking a minute anytime soon. (Really, I'm just happy I can solve it in a few minutes.)

I just did the cube cold (I haven't worked it in more than a week, maybe two) and clocked in at 2:03.76. So I'm comfortably in the 2 to 3 minute zone. It's possible that I've solved it in less than 2 minutes a time or two (probably after solving the cube several times in a row), but if I did I'm sure it was because it was an easier/luckier scramble. (You know, the kind where you can skip a step or two.)

"after 6 months, I cannot remember the last 4 procedures"

Yeah, sometimes if it's been a while since I've solved the cube (and sometimes even if it hasn't) I'll forget one (or some) of the later steps and have to go look it up.

To speed up my time and help me remember the algorithms I spent some time just doing the algorithms like I was practicing scales on the guitar or something. (Starting with a solved cube the main algorithm will be back to the beginning in six cycles, for example. That way I can check my work every 6th cycle of the algorithm to make sure I didn't screw it up.) Just over and over to build up some muscle memory. Left handed, right handed, you get the idea. After a whole lot of practice I've got the “beginner method” down pretty well now.

I've watched a couple videos with people solving some of the larger cubes and I've seen a few of these more exotic shaped puzzles, but I have not spent any time trying to figure them out.

* There really are some exotic Rubik's style puzzles out there in the world...

https://m.media-amazon.com/images/I/71LsxunuWmL.jpg
https://m.media-amazon.com/images/I/61eKAbLz0kL.jpg
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CoAeCy1R6Qo

Cheers to a great evening, Achmed!

☮

PS: Adam, "pssshawww!" says my 11 y/o. He was into this stuff, and the 2x2x2 (NOT as easy as it sounds), 2x2x4 (I have a hard time picturing how it's even built!), 4x4x4, and even 5x5x5, about a year ago to 6 months back.*

I don't think he got the 5x5x5. First you solve the middle 3x3x3, and then you do some of the same procedures as if that core was the same as the core of the standard cube, ... "Nah, I don't want to do this. It'll mess up what I have done!" is always the stumbling block.

I had to go along, so I did learn the Rubic "rubric", as in memorized procedures on the normal cube. Doing the "Daisy", then all whites**, then the bottom row, well, I can "see" what that's about, as I do it. After that, I can't. I have to just go by the steps. How about you, on that?

My kid was getting in some just under 1 minute times. I got a 1:45 just once, but averages are important because there are easy scrambles just based on randomness. He pulled up some site that would give you the scramble (starting with the solved cube), so we could compete. Mostly, I'd get between 2 1/2 and 3 1/2 minutes.

You wrote "a few minutes". How few, Adam? It gets addictive. I know you'll be beating my times, but let me know if you get under a minute.

Finally, this is maybe just me, but, man, after 6 months, I cannot remember the last 4 procedures. I will have to get back on-line.

I'm so glad you brought this up, so I can boast on this kid. However, he doesn't have a blog to write, so no wonder, right??


* Oh, even cooler is a 3x3x3 that is not a cube in shape - it has all mirror-silver sides, but there are faces of different sizes, so one must learn those sizes well to do the cube using the same method. Yeah, he could do that one. Then, did I mention the tetrahedrons yet? It gets pretty "sick" at some point!

** Of course the colors don't matter in terms of order - one can use green, say, as the initial color to make a whole face out of, but it helps to stick to the same one.

PS: Good afternoon, everyone,

Totally off topic...
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0DqfNLxaVi4

I got a little into the cube after talking with a friend of mine on Christmas of last year. He told me his kid is really getting into the cube, so I got one and learned how to solve it. After familiarizing myself with the “beginner method”, I can solve the cube in a few minutes. (Maybe one day I'll learn some of the more advanced algorithms?)

3.134 seconds! Damn...

☮

PS: Oh yeah, Mike Pence from Indiana. I'd have given him the what-for, but I'll write some more to you all in reply to recent comments under that post.

I'm sure this name is spelled starting with a T, based on the text messages. The rest of it hurts my head too much to memorize. I think there's been some budget cuts made by Ob offices and delivery rooms around the country that result in some really old, French, Chinese Pin Yin, and Olde English versions of spell check on their computers. Otherwise, what would be the explanation... I mean?

PS: Haha, funny story, Bill! We were in a rental house once in which the basement had this phone attached to a column and plugged in to a different line too. I believe we got away with a few long-distance calls before our fun was terminated (by either the payer for the other line or our landlord).

Mr. Blanc, who, should, me or Bill H? I think he should first. ;-}

PS

And here I thought you might have received a call from Mike Pence, taking issue with your commentors.

Is that pronounced “cha-nee-qua” or is it actually Shaniqua, as in Queen Shaniqua?

Given Mr Moderators past exchanges with the various call centers of the Subcontinent, he is definitely on the list.

I bought my last firearm with cash.

PS That was naughty. You should denounce yourself.

PS When I moved to Florida in 1969 I was assigned a phone number which, it turned out, was still in use by someone else. The one who got an incoming call was whoever answered first. It was VERY confusing, especially since the other party also had the first name William and was, apparently, also a bachelor.

"Hello," says I.
"Is this Bill?" replies a female voice.
"Yes it is," says I.
"I was just checking to see if you're home," she says.
"Yeah, I'm home," I reply.
"I thought I might come over," she says.
"Sure," says I. "Come on over."

Obviously, she goes to the other Bill's house, and I never knew how much fun or trouble that caused for him. That happened several times before the phone company finally got a new number assigned to me.

PS: Mr. Hail, right, the marketing aspect of all this data collection is annoying, but that's not my main concern. When the Feral Gov't says bend over to Big Biz, Big Biz asks "how far over?"

I am familiar with not particularly the deal being investigated by Rep. Massie, but there was a program with a name doing this consistently. The NRA writes about it, as doe the John Birch Society writers, but the name escapes me. This is a perfect example. One can easily see the nefarious concept and consequences, and also that there's no way the CC companies would say "no" to Nanny Samantha. Even if they say they would say no, I sure wouldn't believe them.

Regarding your last paragraph, yeah, it's more than one concept, but then, if you CAN pay cash, that takes care of things nicely. (Wrt guns, well, there is the background registration, errr, check, on new guns anyway.)

PS: Mr. Hail, I used to enjoy "sparring" with the scammers back when they were live people. In hindsight, I should have left a few of them alone. Later on, a girlfriend told me she had that kind of job for a while. I did not relate any of my anecdotes to her, as she didn't have that kind of sense of humor!

One could say "well, don't work a a place like this." Seinfeld (with Jerry doing that part) had a good quick scene supporting that point.

Anyway, your remarks about the "dossier" they may have on each of us is the reason I really, really try to keep the info. I give out very low, only that required.

In fact, I helped out some students doing a project regarding public health recently, and I told them I would type into/punch in the tablet only approximate stuff on location, age, and give the wrong phone # etc. Surprisingly the bunch of them were pretty cool with that. The one (very cute) girl said "my Dad does the same thing."

We had to think a bit about it together to make sure they got info that would help and not hurt their project, but at the same time making it impossible to figure out who I am. However, I don't know how many people go through all that. Most would either just not care about privacy, or, worse for these students, decide not to participate.

PS

- Cashlessness and the FBI: Revelations -

One of Peak Stupidity's ongoing interests is the "Cash vs. Cashlessness" topic, with (even) credit-card payments included in "Cashlessness," although by the 2020s Cashlessness is substantially wider in scope.

I would like to flag this for your attention, if you have not seen it:

Congressman Thomas Massie and others revealed, two days ago, that a certain credit card company has been feeding to the FBI details of gun sales made its card-holders. This feeding of info to the FBI was without any warrant or cause.

This ongoing action by the credit-car company seems illegal, definitely wrong in spirit. The other-way-'round would be a big problem, legally speaking, if the FBI had "asked" for such lists of details, without warrant or cause, and leaned on credit-card companies to feed them their card-users' info. But what about when it is a company doing it willingly?

Why does Peak Stupidity make such a point about Cashlessness? Alas, it's because the Big-Tech- and Cashlessness-mediated ability to so-easily track what people are doing, "even" when all is legal.

A critic might say this is not necessarily about the Cashlessness controversy, it is really about something more like Big Tech power -- although credit-card companies are not Big Tech as such.

PS

A wrong number is a less-interesting turn than I thought the direction this would go. I thought you'd had some sparring time with some well-organized scammers, especially of the kind who have semi-accurate info on you.

Such calls can be scary, when you realize it's a scam but the South Asians on the other end of the line do have a dossier of some kind on you.