leelin

Best airport mental hack for last-minute types: Get lounge access beyond Priorty Pass

Even though most domestric lounges are hit-or-miss, it's a way to trick myself into getting to the airport 30 to 45 minutes earlier than I would. That way, if I'm running late, worst case I miss the lounge or cut short the time.

For those complaining that lounges are overcrowded with mediocre food, it's true and getting worse. However, it's buffet style - select a healthy salad option with a reasonable protein. Non Priority Pass options are somewhat worthwhile -- United Clubs have gone through a massive upgrade post Covid and so far haven't been too crowded. They also allow access upon arrival, if you really need to fire off some emails and hydrate upon landing.

As for in-flight, for former gaming geeks, try classic emulators. They won't require internet and drain very minimal battery life on your latop.

The adjacent hack is to bring an empty water bottle in your carry-on, which you fill once you clear security. Then, you have a full bottle of water and can decline everything from the "beverage cart" on your flight, meaning you never need to worry about managing a precarious open cup of liquid and ice sitting on your in-flight tray.

Years ago I asked my teacher what percent of street merchants or high school kids would know how to write some of the more complicated, uncommon characters from the advanced textbooks. She replied street merchants maybe 50%, but high school students 100% -- during high school every student will be at their lifetime peak literacy, because they will be cramming and memorizing how to write every possible character in preparation for the college entrance exams.

I tell locals I can "speak, read, and type", but only have 1st grade writing abilities in Mandarin. The key is typing -- you can chat on Line, WeChat, email, or any mobile apps to accomplish day-to-day tasks. But the typing is phoenetic either via Roman pinyin, zhuyin, romaji, etc.

So yes, this problem only comes up in languages where drawing the characters are mostly independent of the pronunciation. You don't need to type individual words, you can type phrases and the input tool presents choices sorted by most commonly used. Therefore, even sending communication is closer to a reading exercise rather than a writing exercise.

I saw "YOLK", as in, a weirdly drawn cracked egg with the yolk pouring out downward and to the left.

Of course, after reading through I'm convinced enough of the mainstream conclusion.

Totally playing devil's advocate, does this loophole work in Twitter's defense?

The WARN act requires large enough employers "provide at least 60 calendar days advance written notice of a plant closing and mass layoff affecting 50 or more employees at a single site of employment."

Ok, so say everyone laid off clearly worked from home for the past 12 months. There was no single site of employment with 50 or more employees. It was just 1 or 2 employees cut from each of 3000 different sites of employment... their own homes?

Obviously, this logic has little chance of working, but I welcome more clarity around whether every w-2 employee needs to be tied to a company office address, and how labor laws might need to change for remote-work situations.

Chess.com has the "personality bots" that supposedly play with the style of various well-known players, streamers, and GMs.

But I remember watching Hikaru Nakamura stream once playing through each of these bots (and beating them fairly easily). He commented that several of the bots were doing things the real players would never do, both in style and even the opening move (1.e4 for a player that almost always opens 1.d4)

It was fairly early after the personality bots came out, so maybe they've fixed it by now.

Fair enough, but that implies there may come a day when mortgage rates are much higher and then housing for new buyers is not at all affordable.

Homeowners that locked in 30-year fixed rates might not be too concerned at first. But eventually, even they may need to move or sell someday. Wages or buying power will need to catch up to avoid some downward price pressure.

I always wondered whether the 7-day cruises were stocked only once at the beginning, or restocked mid-way at ports.

Does that mean they need to freeze lots of the seafood? Is the food less fresh by Day 6 and 7?

My undergrad was a super nerdy school grinding largely solo in the CS lab. Later I did an MBA program to take me completely out of my comfort zone.

I gravitated to those who were chill, and perplexed anyone who tried to play the Status Game by losing on purpose. If it was the chess equivalent, I fall into Fool's Mate on move 2.

Unfortunately, there ARE times when it helps to be able to quickly convey to new acquaintances that you are legitimate and worthwhile for further collaboration. But most of the time, best to turn it off.

Maybe a dumb question from a non-medical guy: are medical images considered "stationary" from a stats viewpoint?

That is, will medical images of diseases we diagnose in the next 20 years look a lot like the ones from the past 20 years, or is there a danger of over-fitting on an evolving data set? Could either the technology or the biology of the disease evolve?

In a prior life I was a quant trader, and financial market data is notorious for having the non-stationary problem. On top of market rules and structures changing all the time, once someone discovers a profitable trading idea, their own actions change what the data looks like for everyone else from that point forward.

One point in defense of the airlines that people often forget. There are certain taxes and fees the airlines must pay when a passenger flies from A to B. However, the government of location B waives fees for connections flying from A to B to C. That makes sense; the passenger never actually visited B.

Passengers can find a cheaper ticket flying JFK->TPE->HKG and ditching the final leg (carry-on only). However, if an airline "knows" a passenger will skip the final leg, then they are helping the individual evade a legitimate tax.

Interesting point on why increased correlation hurts traditional stock pickers and market timers. Does this make a case for quantitative hedge funds doing better?

Quant funds are in a good position to put on a large basket of long and short positions (with leverage), and therefore can separate individual stocks from their confounding market factors. Of course, it presumes the fund has a strategy giving them enough conviction to bet on individual stocks / securities.