Recent Comments

1. 6 days ago on Calvin and Hobbes

   When I was 4, I was in the front seat when my mother hit a fireplug. My face went into the windshield (lots of scabs, but luckily no permanent damage) and lots of water. (Seat belts and child safety seats were years in the future.)

   Worse, she had borrowed her mother-in-law’s new car. We got a second car shortly after.

2. 6 days ago on The Other Coast

   Union Electric hollowed out the top of Taum Sauk Mountain in Missouri in a similar way. At night, when electric was cheaper, they pumped water uphill into the reservoir. During the day, the water ran down and drove a turbine. Unfortunately, they didn’t property monitor the reservoir, and the side of the mountain collapsed in 2005, causing a lot of destruction downstream.

   It’s been reconstructed. The new upper reservoir dam, rebuilt from the ground up, is the largest roller-compacted concrete dam in North America.

   How they screwed up in multiple ways is a cautionary tale for large technology: "A combination of design and construction flaws, continuing to operate the dam when the primary system for gauging the water level was known to be inaccurate (gauge pipes had become detached), moving the “failsafe” secondary gauging system above the actual height of the dam to avoid false positives, and operating the dam in an unsafe manner by routinely overfilling the reservoir caused the upper reservoir dam to overtop. There was no overflow spillway in the original reservoir." (Wikipedia)

3. 6 days ago on The Other Coast

   I think tidal generators are like fusion reactors. Always another 20 years (and many more research grants) away.

4. 8 days ago on Betty

   Comics often descend to adding animals … then talking animals … after a while. Bliss over the last couple of years is one example. Snoopy getting increased prominence over the years is another. Is Betty headed down this path?

5. 8 days ago on Pearls Before Swine

   I’m guessing Monday’s strip through next Saturday’s strip :)

6. 8 days ago on Pearls Before Swine

   What I get chuffed about is the car in second place who honks when the reason the first car hasn’t turned right is because there’s a person with a stroller / old lady / other pedestrian in the crosswalk.

7. 8 days ago on Gasoline Alley

   “waiting for the electrician, or someone like him” … nice callout to Firesign Theatre.

8. 8 days ago on 9 to 5

   Too true to be funny.

9. 11 days ago on Frazz

   Perhaps the most valuable lesson you learned in school that day.

10. 11 days ago on Frazz

    Yes, but when I was in school in Kentucky I really would have liked it.