From a Tumblr post that has been reposted a few times (in fact, my link is to the earliest repost I could find, as I think the original is long gone):
The sun is probably the closest thing we’ll ever have to a true Eldritch Abomination. Hear me out here-
Older than recorded history; was here longer than any of us and will be here long after we leave. Has a finite beginning and end but is still incomprehensibly ancient
Burns itself into your vision instantly and can blind you if you look for too long
Further prolonged exposure can cause cancerous growths
Non-humanoid shape floating through space; colossal flaming tentacles angrily lash out on occasion
Sort of just appeared one day and is now surrounded by the corpses of its stillborn children
People used to sacrifice other people to appease it
Are you under the impression that families are going to the grocery store every day and trying to eat everything within 48 hours of picking it up from the store? No, people are buying the week's worth of stuff and might not be getting to actually cooking it until 6 days later.
Buy a week's worth of food, with each perishable item in quantities small enough to go into a few meals per week, out of the 21 meals you'll be eating that week.
Fresh vegetables and fruit last a week or two. Fresh meat lasts a week. Eggs last a few weeks. Most dairy products last a week or two.
Make meals out of a combination of fresh ingredients, dry goods (pasta, rice, beans, breads), canned/preserved foods/sauces/condiments, frozen foods. With basically one perishable feature ingredient per dinner, it doesn't take that much planning to feed yourself for maybe 10-25% as much as it costs from takeout or restaurants. Even if your food waste is double as a single person, that's still 20-50% the cost.
It's true of all combat sports, and, to some degree, any other sport in which you go face to face with your opponent.
And although it might be true that at the very very top levels people both learn to be more ambidextrous (so that there's less of a mismatch between sides whether right or left handed) and are more experienced/skilled at dealing with left handed opponents, the early years of learning the sport will weed out fewer left handed people so that the top levels have more left handed people.
That's not part of this comparison. The comparison in this article and the metric it covers is for people who are renting versus buying in 2024. The renter in 2024 can rent from a landlord who purchased in 2010, and is borrowing at 2020 interest rates. But a buyer today is buying at 2024 prices and 2024 interest rates.
Two things: first, landlords aren't entitled to a profit, and second, landlord input costs might be completely different from an owner resident.
On the first point, if the landlord's costs are $2000/month, and the market rent for that unit is $1900/month, the landlord would rather lose $100/month on a lease than lose $2000/month on a vacant property.
On the second, it might be that the landlord bought the place when it was much cheaper, or has a much lower interest rate than what is available today. So if the landlord's costs are $2000/month for a property that would now cost $4000/month at today's purchase prices and interest rates, but can rent for $3000/month at a profit to himself.
Similarly, some volume landlords can spread certain costs around and not pay nearly as much as an owner resident. It might cost $1200 to hire a plumber to do a 6-hour job, but it also might cost $150 to simply have a plumber on the payroll to do that job, if you've got enough steady work that it's cheaper to have him around.
In the U.S., the convention set by the national chains are small (10"), medium (12"), and large (14"), with some having extra large (16") as an option. Most local places will follow that convention as well.
The Chinese have a method for curing eggs in alkaline solution until they turn black and somewhat translucent, too.
With olives, there's basically no way to eat them off the tree and have them taste edible. They have to be processed in some way to remove the bitter compounds, usually by brining or curing. So using an alkaline brine is one method, and not that uncommon (even for other colors of olives).
Other uses of alkaline compounds in cooking include using a lye bath for browning for baking pretzels or bagels, certain types of springiness and chewiness for noodles (for example, for fresh ramen), and processing corn into cornmeal through nixtamalization.
I'm convinced that Damon Baehrel is a semi-fake restaurant. Like, it's real, but doesn't actually take reservations or serve real guests, and the owner/chef lies about everything in order to seem more mysterious.
So I don't think it's a particularly good example of fine dining, as it's doing a lot of things different from a normal restaurant that is open to members of the public.
Is this lady the hitchhiker from There's Something About Mary, copying Stephen Covey's Seven Habits of Highly Effective People?
Hitchhiker : You heard of this thing, the 8-Minute Abs?
Ted : Yeah, sure, 8-Minute Abs. Yeah, the exercise video.
Hitchhiker : Yeah, this is going to blow that right out of the water. Listen to this: 7... Minute... Abs.
Ted : Right. Yes. OK, all right. I see where you're going.
Hitchhiker : Think about it. You walk into a video store, you see 8-Minute Abs sittin' there, there's 7-Minute Abs right beside it. Which one are you gonna pick, man?
Ted : I would go for the 7.
Hitchhiker : Bingo, man, bingo. 7-Minute Abs. And we guarantee just as good a workout as the 8-minute folk.
Ted : You guarantee it? That's - how do you do that?
Hitchhiker : If you're not happy with the first 7 minutes, we're gonna send you the extra minute free. You see? That's it. That's our motto. That's where we're comin' from. That's from "A" to "B".
Ted : That's right. That's - that's good. That's good. Unless, of course, somebody comes up with 6-Minute Abs. Then you're in trouble, huh?
[Hitchhiker convulses]
Hitchhiker : No! No, no, not 6! I said 7. Nobody's comin' up with 6. Who works out in 6 minutes? You won't even get your heart goin, not even a mouse on a wheel.
Ted : That - good point.
Hitchhiker : 7's the key number here. Think about it. 7-Elevens. 7 dwarves. 7, man, that's the number. 7 chipmunks twirlin' on a branch, eatin' lots of sunflowers on my uncle's ranch. You know that old children's tale from the sea. It's like you're dreamin' about Gorgonzola cheese when it's clearly Brie time, baby.
James Cameron has a history of making great things happen with a low budget, and spending millions responsibly to actually make a positive difference in big budget films.
Did you not read the article? It was regarded as a B-movie when it came out: a low-budget sci-fi slasher/horror film. Arnold referred to it as a B-movie when asked about it on the set of Conan the Barbarian (which had 3 times the budget as Terminator). The New York Times referred to it as a B-movie in its review, as discussed by this article, which is also why the headline uses quotes around "B-movie."
A million (bleep)ing diamonds!