Um, I don't think I've ever seen that done wherever I've lived. Seems to me it would just be another reason for me to fumble-finger and drop something. Anyway, in NY they'll also count the change out for you as they're handing it to you. Of course, in CA you don't have to bag your own items. Trade-off, I guess. Anyway, I almost always use a debit card - easier and cleaner. The only exception is the dollar store, where you have to purchase at least $5.00 worth of items, which makes sense for both parties. A little silly to buy a 99-cent item and put it on a debit card.
Right now I have a $20 bill in my wallet, leftover from some Christmas cash my wife gave me. It's the first time I can remember having any money in my wallet in a very long time.
One of my paranoid friends in the San Fernando Valley (redundancy, I know), insists "You should always have several bills in various denominations as well as change in your wallet in case there's a quake big enough to knock out all the cash registers and stores won't take debit/credit cards." Now, granted, she was here for the Northridge quake, but I'd like to believe things have improved somewhat since then. I also don't keep x-number of gallons of water and a crank-powered radio and a first-aid kit (hey, I've got band-aids and antiseptic and all that cool stuff, anyway) and, and, and... which apparently all the rest of her friends do. Maybe it's because I'm not on a major fault-line? (A few minor fault lines, but the biggest quake I ever felt - not the scariest one; that was the aftershocks from the Mexican quake about 7-8 years ago - was a 4.0 a few miles from here two days before 09/11/2001). That quake was more sound than shake; anyone who's ever been on an elevated subway platform in NYC knows what that's like. Didn't even wake my neighbor's dog, who'd bark if there was a squirrel in the yard. Or maybe it's because I'm from NY. Hurricanes, blizzards, blackouts, the occasional waterspout/tornado, cold that freezes subway switches and kills your water heater on the coldest day of the year. Meh. Bring it, mofo. Bring it!
Meh, I been though the big one in Japan. I barely feel anything below a 6.0 We had that one in Los Angeles on the 4th of July 2019, and I was surprise I felt shaking from that 120 away in San Diego.
I used cash to give to a homeless dude outside a Taco Bell drive thru a couple weeks back (he was wearing a mask). First time in a year I’d touched any.
I worked part time at the Bristol Renaissance Faire for a couple years prior to 2020. My boss from the Faire sent me a Christmas card with a $50 bill. Then, a couple weeks later, sent a New Years card explaining that she'd written me a check for $100 and sent the $50 by mistake, so she sent another $50 bill. So, yea, both times were the first time in a year that I'd touched any cash. I bought lottery tickets with it.
We had s 6.5 in Boise last March. Scared the dog shit out of me. I’ve been through a 6.8 on Grand Cayman and big ones in Alaska and Japan. The fact that they come without warning makes them the scariest for me.
the frustration for me is that despite bike lanes on both sides of the major streets surrounding my 'hood cyclists will still ride on the sidewalks.
Today we shall discuss bicyclists. You know them, they're the dipshits who think traffic laws don't apply to them. Running stoplights and stop signs, using the sidewalk/crosswalk to avoid a red light and then swerving right back into the roadway, refusing to keep right, never signaling turns or other maneuvers, in general just being oblivious douchebags. In most jurisdictions a bicycle counts as a vehicle when on public roads and must obey all the same traffic laws as every other vehicle, except for the license plate thing. And trust me, as soon as some politician thinks they can get away with licensing bicycles, we'll see that happen. I used to like riding a bike, but fell out of the habit after joining the Navy. Roads where I grew up were not the high speed death lanes of the DC area and there were plenty of unpaved back roads to tool around on. But back then you just hopped on and went. Nowadays you have to have the special bicycle clothes, the special bicycle shoes, the helmet, and so forth. And the thing that many cyclists seem to ignore or forget is that a biker on a wheeled frame is always, always going to lose the argument with the two-ton steel murder machine driven by the psychopathic retard who is also not paying attention to the road. America seems to be slowly recognizing the advantages of being bicycle-friendly, though. For example, in many places old unused railroad tracks are being taken up and the right-of-way for them converted to foot/bike paths. Cities are experimenting with bike lanes where streets have room for them. Bicycles themselves are getting much better - lighter, stronger, better gear systems, etc. And I just saw a story about a DC to Seattle bike trail being developed. THAT would be cool, sort of a bicycle Appalachian Trail kind of deal.
