Back from America

I'm back home from America. I had a marvellous time. Darcy and Gisella, and Anna, and Jen are really lovely, and Berkeley/San Francisco and New York are great.

I'd been warned that America was not as used to vegetarians as England, and indeed, if I'd been there with non-vegetarian friends it might indeed have been awkward, but most of the bits I saw looked like a big boat full of beautiful helpful people had crashed into a big boat full of good vegetarian restaurants, and where they washed ashore someone said "hey, let's build a city like this".

The California climate is really lovely. We were lucky with the New York Climate, because it was less boiling humid than it normally was, but it was still boiling humid.

American and English Urinals

Urinals generally consist of a tall porcelain slab against the wall merging into a bowl at the bottom at a convenient peeing-height. See picture http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Urinal.

Traditional British urinals have a hole in the bottom, and a common cistern which pours water through all of the urinals every so often. Some American urinals are similar, except that the flush is operated by a handle.

The British system is what I'm used to, and perhaps marginally quicker. And means you don't have to touch a handle which may be contaminated with other people's penis-cooties, although most British men don't seem to worry about that.

It has the disadvantage that the urinal isn't guaranteed to be washed between every use.

I'm not sure which is more water efficient: the British system will flush regularly even if few people have used the urinals, but the American system will flush every time.

Fancy Technological Urinals have infra-red sensors which automatically flush when someone stands in front of them for a while, and then moves away, which I'm not used to yet, but seems to be reasonably reliable.

However, the majority of American urinals don't work quite as well as this: they fill up with urine, and are only emptied when they're flushed, so they rely on American males and clueless foreign males remembering to flush them, and if not, the next person gets a mildly unpleasant sight. Why is that? A hole in the bottom seems like the simplest urinal technology imaginable -- why didn't more toilets explore that solution, even before the fancy infra-red version was invented?

Fox news compares socialised healthcare to soylent green. True or False?

Poll #985 Fox news and socialised healthcare

Open to: Registered Users, detailed results viewable to: All, participants: 4

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Fox news compared socialised healthcare to soylent green

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True
2 (50.0%)

False
1 (25.0%)

True, but only because I know what you're referring to beforehand
1 (25.0%)

False, but only because I know what you're referring to beforehand
0 (0.0%)

(This is a poll on Dreamwidth. Let me know if it doesn't display correctly. If you're commenting on LJ, I assume you'll have to go to DW to vote.)

Daily Mail vs Investor's Business Weekly

Investor's Business Weekly: "People such as scientist Stephen Hawking wouldn't have a chance in the U.K., where the National Health Service would say the life of this brilliant man, because of his physical handicaps, is essentially worthless."

Daily Mail: That would be an excellent point, except that it turns out Stephen Hawking is English. And actually was treated by the NHS.

Many other newspapers made the same points, but I was enchanted to find myself agreeing with the daily mail I had to link to them. The investor.com article now contains a retraction about Hawking not being English (although they don't feel it invalidates their main point).