I'm in the later stages of purchasing a niche sub-contractor in the SE US. I'm now working with the sellers on the nitty gritty handover items that need to be transitioned. Here is a summary of my working list:

Insurance: (Staying with current provider)
- auto coverage on fleet of 40+ vehicles.
- General liability policy.
- Workers Comp policy.
- Bonding, done on a job by job basis, for a minority of their work. (I got a backup quote from another bonding agent for a fall back).

Benefits:
- I'm doing an asset purchase, so retirement benefits will likely have to start fresh under new entity. Will keep the same provider.
- Health Insurance will remain with incumbent, but have to migrate and re-enroll everyone under new LLC.
- Exhaustive list of emp perks.

Payroll:
- Currently done in-house, and paid weekly. Will keep the same, but need to get everything lined up based on timing of close and bank account. (See below).

Bank Accounts:
- Goal is to keep the same bank account for now, to reduce number of changes- less to go wrong. Built in a true-up with sellers for any payments post-close that shouldn't have carried over. MAKE SURE to change authorized signers.

Dear Sydney: some tips for wearing masks....

* Invest in finding the right mask for your face. Some material may be irritating, some designs may be the wrong shape for your head, some ties may hurt your years. If you’re going to be wearing a mask every day have a think about what works best for you

* Get the seal tight to your face: it shouldn’t be bagging around your chin or cheeks.

* You can stop glasses fogging up by making sure the seal of the mask is close to your skin of your nose or using a little cloth tape to stick it down

* Brush your teeth before leaving the house. Chew gum or suck on a mint. Don’t eat anchovies and onion just before putting a mask on

THREAD

1. @bobforgovernor OP-ED for @WSJ about Hartford clearly struck a nerve as members of the democrat establishment have come out of the woodwork to criticize him. Thus far, the criticisms have all been political and no one has provided a counterfactual.

2. Hartford, like many other Connecticut cities, is a financial mess. The city has not had a Republican Mayor for 50 years since Antonina Uccello, the city’s first female mayor, resigned in 1971 for a Federal Appointment. Before that, the last Republican mayor served in 1948.

3. The history of the common council is similar. E.g. Democrats have controlled the state’s capital for over 50 years and implemented their policies accordingly. You can try to spin it how you want but the results are clear from the economy to crime to education.

4. More recently, the current Mayor of Hartford, Luke Bronin, sought a $550 million dollar bailout from the state. That is not exactly indicative of a city that has been managed effectively. The mill rate and debt are out of control.

5. Are there examples of cities in CT that are run well? Yes. The best run cities in Connecticut are run by Republicans - @erinstewartct in New Britain, Mark Lauretti in Shelton, & until recently Danbury by Mark Boutghton. You can debate policies, you cannot debate the outcomes.

thokozani. i understand that consulting with isangoma is still an act that is shrouded in secrecy and is a source of shame for many. it is this shame and secrecy that makes people ripe for exploitation and harm.

i am not here to perpetuate already existing boogeyman narratives about my job but i beg you all to never, ever go to a sangoma without alerting at least one person of your whereabouts.

unless you know you are up to no good wena self, it should be an easy location pin drop and "friend, this is where i am should you not hear from me in x hours." no further explanation necessary.

we must admit without taking it with our chests that certain generalisations exist because there are certain individuals that perpetuate them. that's life. i will give personal anecdotes:

there is a client that came asking for help some months back. her life was at a standstill and she didn't understand why until, together, we connected the dots. her secret trips to isangoma sakhe were not what i would call normal.

"I had learned too much history not to know that the great masses always and at once respond to the force of gravity in the direction of the powers that be. I knew that the same voices which yelled “Heil Schuschnigg” today would thunder “Heil Hitler” tomorrow."
- Stefan Zweig

“The herd instinct of the mob was not yet as offensively powerful in public life as it is today; freedom in what you did or did not do in private life was taken for granted...toleration was not deplored as a weakness & debility, but was praised as an ethical force”
- Stefan Zweig

“It remains an irrefragable law of history that contemporaries are denied a recognition of the early beginnings of the great movements which determine their times.”
- Stefan Zweig, The World of Yesterday

“How Lilliputian all those anxieties were, how serene that time!”
- Stefan Zweig, The World of Yesterday

“For a society is always most cruel to those who disclose and reveal its secrets, when through dishonesty society itself has outraged Nature.”
- Stefan Zweig, The World of Yesterday

ON PRINCIPLES

The recent censorship events have shown that many don't understand what's a principle.

If you only practice it when convenient, it's not a principle.

1/11

This doesn't mean that a principle cannot be partisan.

For example, "I put the family first" can be a principle.

But then you must put your family first, both when it's convenient for you and when it isn't.

Otherwise it's not a principle.

2/11

What is the purpose of principles?

They keep us focused on the long term when the short term would misguide us

For example, I do not like Trump. And yet, yesterday I defended his free speech. Because I believe that defending free speech is ultimately good for everyone.

3/11

Principles protect us from undesired or unthinkable consequences.
They protect us from the problems we didn't experience and from what could go wrong.

They are there for when we think they could be transgressed. They are there for when we think it makes sense to skip them.

4/11

Rights are a form of principles.

Rights are preserved by granting them to our enemies.

The moment we cease to grant them when inconvenient for us, we cease to have them too.

The moment we destroy their sanctity, we open the door to someone else taking them from us.

5/11

Aries, Leo, Sagittarius, 2021 tarot reading -

2020 was a year of rebirth and awakening for you. A lot of you went through a massive change, which lead you to discover who you are on a deeper level, and open your eyes to a whole different side of life, and what you want from it

I see a big change happened for you last year. Something that you thought was going to be in your life forever, or someone, wasn’t anymore. There was a certain direction you saw yourself going in, but last year caused you to have to re-evaluate that, and that wasn’t easy for you.

I see here a lot of you could have dealt with a break up. This person could have lacked emotional maturity when handling this, therefore causing you a lot of pain. I see this whole situation triggered a lot within you. A lot of fears, and negative behaviours came to the surface.

This may have highlighted some of the aspects of yourself you did not want to see or face, but ultimately you had to. I do see this is something you’re still working through, which there’s nothing wrong with of course! Everything, especially healing, takes time! And that is okay

I do see that last year you spent a lot of time analysing your thoughts. You may have spent a lot of time alone, going through this rebirth and transformation. You should be proud of yourself for this, as it wasn’t easy, but you got through it!

The Purleighan Realms: Dragonfall

Darsyx held him, but only just. Part of the God of Protection understood exactly what his friend was going through, and refused to bring his full strength to bear, but he worried that might have to.

Vrayl was not himself.

"WHO FUCKING DID THIS, NERMAL?! WHO!?" Vrayl lunged, and Darsyx slammed him to the tiled floor of Nermal's throne room. Vrayl let loose a strangled roar as Darsyx expertly wrapped one arm around his neck, locking it in.

The throne room shook as a pulse of Vrayl's power sent tiles flickering away like leaves in the wind. Even with Darsyx's arm around his throat, Vrayl still dragged himself back to his feet, another step closer. "SHE'S DEAD, NERMAL. MY TENLEE IS DEAD!"

"Vrayl," interjected Darsyx, trying not to snarl. "You need to calm down. Dont make me end you. Please."

Darsyx moved to tighten the choke, but Vrayl spun and dropped, neatly slipping free of the choke.

He whirled, claws alight with divine energy, the spectral form of his true self crackling around him. "WHO KILLED HER, NERMAL?! WHO FUCKING KILLED HER?! I TRIED TO BRING HER BACK, NERMAL. I TRIED TO BRING HER BACK.

THE EVIL ACCIDENT OF TIME:

Recently, I was blessed to speak with my Teacher, the Honorable Minister Louis Farrakhan, wherein I asked him concerning ‘the evil accident of time’...

...and coming from what the Most Honorable Elijah Muhammad has taught regarding the reality of ALLAH (GOD) and His Mastery over all the Forces of his Creation, my question to him was “Why is the term ‘accident’ associated with time?” ...

And again, coming from the mindset that ALLAH (GOD) is the Author of Time, the Giver of Life, and the Cause of Death, where does ‘accident’ come in?

...Considering my question, I was thoroughly enlightened by his response, and I’d like to share with you the guidance I got from him in this study:

‘Evil’ means to exceed the measure or limit. An ‘accident’ is what we commit when conducting our lives and affairs without giving what we do much thought.

1/

time for a little bit of a bragging thread

2/

in hunter gatherer societies, male speed, strength and dexterity peaks in the mid 20s, but hunting success peaks closer to 40

the difference is decades of acquired wisdom about all sorts of tiny things

3/

In infoworker economies I think something similar happens. Fluid intelligence peaks in the 20s or so, but graybeards have seen all manner of complicated Charlie Foxtrots and can start to predict where they're going to happen.

4/

I build this complicated app that communicates with Vast Third Party via three different APIs, a mix of XML, JSON, etc.

Two of these APIs are outgoing / push (from my PoV), one is inbound.

Three weeks ago Third Party pinged us and placed an order. We responded "ok".

5/

Then, apparently, Third Party pinged us again and placed a second order... and is now upset because second order didn't ship.

We have no record of a second order in our system, and we don't have enough inventory to fulfill it.

I’ll also go on another Orwell tangent: Conservatives love calling any new “woke” word that enters common usage as “Orwellian”, because they don’t want to be “forced” by social pressure to learn new terminology important to people whose humanity they refuse to acknowledge anyway

But Newspeak is a version of English where descriptive words have been removed, not added. 1984 is written with a deeply limited vocabulary set.......so in fact, conservatives share an ideology with *the villains* of 1984.

Newspeak is not called that because the words are new. It’s called that because that’s *exactly* what authoritarian fascists would call a restrictive language set, it’s propaganda. The state in the book came up with the name, and that context is important

It’s “Newspeak” for the same reason they’re “National Socialists”, an intentional misnomer intended to obscure reality, to wear down your defences. Fascists don’t call a spade a spade, they point at a cloudy sky and say “it is sunny”, until you’re tired of arguing with them.

Fascists may claim to value free speech, but they jump at the chance to censor specific words, and it’s not the words they themselves would use. That’s why they hate obscenities and any kind of terminology related to social justice, but not slurs.

The evidence is in, and the UK variant does appear to be of great concern. The viral load of infected people is higher, and it seems to be about 50% more transmissible. It doesn’t appear to cause more severe illness, but more cases will unfortunately result in greater mortality.

The estimated viral load of people infected with the new variant is substantially higher, although it is not yet clear why. Further laboratory studies will hopefully explain

In contrast to early speculation, children do not appear to be markedly more susceptible to the new variant.

An investigation using NHS contact tracing data found 15.1% of contacts of people infected with the new variant became infected, compared to 9.8% of contacts of people infected with an older

Mortality does not seem to be substantially different.

In an analysis of 2,700 people followed for 28 days, 0.89% of people with the new variant died compared to 0.73% of those with older variants. This was not statistically

Dear anons and Secular Maldives proponents: 12,020 is over, and we made a lot of progress on the #SecularMaldives front. We pushed many important conversations publicly, drove controversial positions in the country while exposing those ideas to a bigger audience. 🧵 /1

We also engaged with the public and started discussing secular politics by injecting our selves into strategic conversations and we forced ourselves into relevance hile changing the entire face of public discourse in the country. /2

We gave a strong message that we exist and we matter. Now we must scale up the activism. Recent Vaguthu article showed the extent of problem. Regular folks were scared and silenced off while Islamists dominated comments and conversation around the article. /3

This needs to change and that change can only be achieved through sustained engagement and dialogue. Keep this up, and we will start chipping away their ideological dominance in the country, eventually towards a win. This is in your hands. /4

When you engage, and gain traction, you begin changing public perceptions. This is described in political science as shifting the Overton Window. /5

I thought I would make a new end of year CHOOSE YOUR OWN RADIATION ADVENTURE, except I realized I kept running face first into "All Of The Above".

So instead, I want to discuss archetypical accidents to try to encourage you to not be the cause/victim in one.

As we approach NYE 2020 with restrictions in place and limited staffing, on top of the usual ghost towns that institutions become during the holidays as the older staff members take use-it-or-lose-it vacations, we are particularly vulnerable to the first archetype: Work Alone

As a general rule, when you are doing particularly nasty things, high power laser alignment, critical lifts, easily dispersible radioactive materials, high voltage, etc. you don't do it by yourself.

The counterpoint is "I always do this by myself to minimize the number of people exposed to $HAZARD" is valid, but more you're the hands up close and personal. But you aren't alone. Someone's in shouting distance.

This time of year, you may be the only person in the building.

For better or worse, the holidays are when people try to do some of the most hazardous work or long delayed maintenance that makes everything else more dangerous, like repairing fume hood motors, because the number of other people whose work they could impact is reduced.

i finished the wire yesterday.

i was so disappointed in so many of the people in power.

i can't stop thinking about the kids from season 4 - dukie, randy, michael, bug, namond. even wallace from season 1.

reading about ACEs and their impact and how that was portrayed

thread.

According to Corcoran and McNulty (2018), adverse childhood experiences are “traumatic events (e.g., sexual abuse, physical abuse, emotional abuse) or chronic stressors (e.g., neglect, parental separation) that are uncontrollable to the child”

They can include:
- all kinds of abuse
- household challenges
- DV towards mum
- parental separation
- criminal household member
- mental illness
- substance abuse

The theory behind ACEs is that they lead to neurobiological impacts and health risks, which in turn lead to long-term social and health problems. The greater the neurobiological impacts and health risks, the more serious the lifelong consequences to health and wellbeing.

In a systematic review specifically examining school-related outcomes of traumatic event exposure, Perfect et al (2016) identified 44 studies that examined cognitive functioning, 34 that examined academic functioning and 24 that examined social-emotional-behavioural functioning.