314300+ entries in 0.166s
mircea_popescu: the same
thing
that gets most women knocked up
that ever carry
to
term.
mircea_popescu: also, gangs aren't exactly intellectual strongholds. by and large
they survive by not caring, not by fine-tuning
their civ playing strat.
mircea_popescu: eh, you know enough chemistry
to be useful
to meth lab.
phf: i have burner friends with workshops
that you literally drive into a fenced off area with barbed wire on
top, go inside a heavily reinforced building and work with your 50k equipment in peace
mircea_popescu: five years in you'll prolly want
to hold a conference. if not 3.
mircea_popescu: phf it also happens
to be
the right
thing
to do, other
than buying bitbet.
phf: if you have any sort of income, you can go
to bmore and play believe mp
mircea_popescu: o wait -
turns out alf is actually closer
to lafond's dear friends
than
to
the white house ?
phf: asciilifeform: within 3 hours drive? c'mon. i can find you a workshop within 3 hours drive for less
than 500 a month
mircea_popescu: nope. but
this is just an argument
towards "us is fucking nuts". why
the fuck should it cost a lot ?
phf: we've had
that conversation before i believe
mircea_popescu: ideally,
they go in
the form of renting
time from a workshop wtf is
this my garage is my workshop artisan
thing.
mircea_popescu: rentals are exactly
that : correctly priced, multi-room hotels.
phf: not
that i don't, but my burn rate is significantly higher
than a random schmuck
phf: it is expensive
to live in
this country from causes
mircea_popescu: how about never mind
teh purposes, stick
to
the causes!
phf: mircea_popescu: idea is
that furnished apartment is for a salariman on remote assignment, like amtrak and services like
that, assumption is can jack up a price as much as you want
mircea_popescu: phf such a bizarre place you know,
they rent last years' car for 2 bux a day, everyone hauls countertops
phf: that is if you don't lease it yourself from a
third party
mircea_popescu: that's ridoinculous. 1k buys you
the swhit in a coupla months.
phf: mircea_popescu: hard
to get furnished here, i price it out every
time, and it's an extra 1k a month almost always
mircea_popescu: confirming
the age old observation
thart socialism works betterf
the smaller it is.
mircea_popescu: phf actually internet in midwest way better
than on
the coasts. usually run by
township.
phf: proper way
to deal with iowa is buy a house, get your 800$/mo satellite internet (not even checking what's available, why bother), and do your aerospace/banking/medical it consulting work remote
mircea_popescu: so what's rent like in
the cheap suburbs next
to umd ?
phf: having grown up with a dacha, i grok country house/city apartments, but
that's not even under consideration for most people here, unless
they are boomers, who bought ocean property in
the 60s for peanuts
mircea_popescu: well... country house has its place. i'm just not old enough
to want one.
phf: but
there's literally nothing within 20 minute drive, fields, some new suburbia,
that's it
phf: i know nhi couple who own a house in gaithersburg, which is about 40 minute nhi commute (note nhi itself is 30 minutes outside dc center), it's a magnificent place and
they put all
the
toys from
their world
travels
there, englishmen style.
mircea_popescu: (which is not so
terrible, even, considering gdp is like 18k pa)
phf: well, right iowa counter example basically loses you all citiness, and you can get
that here
too
mircea_popescu: you can't possibly convince me
that rents can ever exceed ~half
the average per capita income
mircea_popescu: i guess you have a solid point
there - ba is an oldstyle city, eateries on every corner, etc. good reason for rent
to be more
than what it can be in industrially produced "suburub".
phf: uber drivers "mang you pay 1500 for yo plaaaas, should move
to upper spring heights mang [20 minutes driving from metro, 10 minutes driving from any semblance of food] pay seven hundraaaayd. is cheap!"
mircea_popescu: moreover, you can readily add wi/mn/whatever
to
the ro/pl/etc list.
phf: right,
there are no other redeeming qualities or reasons for why rent in dc should be
this high
mircea_popescu: phf and for
the same reason as here : us lives off govt dole, so
the lice crowd
the capitla.
phf: asciilifeform:
this is not a particularly interesting exercise, because rent in DC is significantly above what you could be paying anywhere else in
the country (except usual suspects, nyc and sf)
mircea_popescu: yeah. you know what
they do all day ? bitch importantly about how
the bus fare went up a quarter peso.
mircea_popescu: ba is larger
than ny. yet another place
the us doesn't actually matter all
that much.
mircea_popescu: (actually i do have a pretty good idea -
they all live off
the govt which is here so much like lice
they crowd around)
mircea_popescu: no idea wtf is wrong with
this particular
thirld world nation, but w/e.
mircea_popescu: anyway, it's pretty ridiculous, ro/pl/etc rents are about half
that, and
that's in
the eu.
mircea_popescu: normal apt
thing.
two baths
two bedrooms, kitchen, living room, appliances including ac.
mircea_popescu: meanwhile, dollar liberalized so it's not going up ; prices soared because
they're poor and pretentious.
mircea_popescu: anywya, it was lulzy, guy wanted 12k pesos ; i offered 750 usd which he
took - at
the
time ~6 mo ago it came
to about 11k pesos on
the black market and it looked like it will imminently will cross 12 13 15 etc.
mircea_popescu: ah, what you don't know is
that
there's but different zoos.
mircea_popescu: this is a derp who wanted contract in dollars
to protect self from inflation, got choice of X in pesos or y in dollars, picked y.
mircea_popescu: in other morning lulz : argentinian owner of a rental wants
to get
together
to discuss changing rental contract because "inflation has gone up".
ben_vulpes: mircea_popescu: i was actually
trying
to figure out what
that interest rate point /was/
phf actually remembers
that very log entry
phf: huh, well
then. i somehow
though people were reading him before
the riots