Category Archives: Information

Five Years of Gas Can Hell!

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Gas Can Hell

Our intrusive federal government has regulated the gas can. In its unbounded wisdom it decided that American citizens to unable to use a vented gas can. Thus we cannot have a gas can that works.

This article explains this and includes the following quote “[The EPA] is always looking for new and innovative ways to spread as much human misery as possible.”

Because a vent is necessary to evenly and reliably pour gas from a can, old, but now-outlawed, vented cans are selling for 2-5x their original cost on Ebay. Or as the article points out, one can just by a 5-gallon, vented, water can, wink-wink.

UPDATE: Here’s another solution

Mundaneum

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Just read about the Mundaneum is a PM article with (the over-blown) title of How the Humble Index Card Foresaw the Internet. It is not about the internet. The Mundenuem, created in 1905, was a databased that organized all knowledge in a card index. You could argue it was a precursor to Google–at least in goal. You could say it was a victim of its own success because it grow to 18 million card in 15 thousand drawers, which was unmanageable.

How to Read a Book a Week

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This article has a great tip on reading non-fiction: do not read non-fiction word-for-word like fiction books. Fiction requires that the reader immerse in the author’s world. Non-fiction tries to convey an idea.

Here is method from linked article.

  1. Start with the author
  2. Read the title, the subtitle, the front flap, and the table of contents.
  3. Read the introduction and the conclusion.
  4. Read/skim each chapter.
  5. End with the table of contents again.

See the original article for the full explanation of the method.