That sounds more like a pet problem or a training issue than a transportation issue though.

Have you heard a freight train horn compared to a light rail horn? They’re much quieter.

As for your situation, might I suggest instead pressuring the neighbors to help you apply for a permit for a “railroad quiet zone”? In my state at least that is a thing where a neighborhood can pressure a rail company via local government to have a designated corridor like this. The corridor will have any railroad crossings updated to have a “NO HORN” indicated signage since the train will not blast its horn on approach to the intersection, similar to this picture but my state also has requirements that the intersection will have speakers playing a sound indication that a train is approaching, and the train will have its bell ringing but no loud train horn. It’s much quieter than the normal setup where they must per federal law lay on that horn multiple times as they come up on an intersection.

Hi vegan here. Okay not really, I’m from the south and we eat the hell out of ground beef pork bbq etc all the time lmao.

Just because a small low income populated city is having financial troubles does not mean that the large and medium sized cities cannot do better with how lackluster they are being. Cincinnati can have some bus and transit improvements despite Appalachia to the east having ghost towns everywhere. Detroit can have a light rail network and commuter buses despite Flint having a water crisis. And Houston should never have cancelled their mass transit plans of MetroNEXT because their new mayor hates the idea of it and picked cabinet members to kill it, even if we are in the midst of an immigration crisis to the south.

Re on groceries, another awesome tool that I like for living car-lite in the south of all places is grocery delivery. For 50 buckaroos a year Walmart will bring your groceries straight to your doorstep, no bullshit required. No driving to the local supermarket, no slow crawling looking for parking, no darting through a sketchy looking parking lot at night, no crowded aisles and dodgy people on motor carts inside, no half hour long line for checkout, no please remove item from the bagging area calling an attendant to give your introverted ass a heart attack from an unwarranted conversation. Literally open the website add items and it just shows up at my door the next day. I also feel I make my money back because I’m not spending on impulse purchases. And I can shop in my underwear if I feel like it!

The one with a stop within 3 miles of your house, and a connecting bus that runs through every 15-30 minutes can take you closer. Or if you’re like me leave the bike at the station and bike home after.

Gadgetbahn^TM

The trick is you do both buses and trains. You use the buses to connect communities that don’t have large transit requirements between them and then for commuting you use buses to direct people to train stations where they can get the trains to work/ where they need to go en masse. Transportation is a multilevel solution that requires multiple modes to get people where they need to go but you can’t just rely on buses as quite frankly they lack the ability move all that many people even across quite short distances.

Multi-modal transport! This really is the way to do it and it’s a damn shame that so many governments still seem hell-bent on the highway only. TxDOT’s motto literally might as well be if you don’t like it get out. The way it should be is this: If you wanna drive, drive but you are going to pay for your fair share. Nothing terribly expensive as seen $9 a day is all it takes in New York, and as an added benefit the reduced traffic from people taking other means will cause less car traffic for you. Sunny day and you want to enjoy the scenery, you got time? Separate grade bike paths along multipurpose drainage areas already being used and government-owned ROW, can bike wherever you’re going on those shorter trips. Pouring rain outside and not safe to ride, but don’t want to drive? Take the bus, a raincoat will keep you dry for the walk between home and the covered bus stop. Need to get to the airport across town? That’s 30 miles, take the train and you’ll be there soon and not have to worry about car parking since you left the car at home.

This really is how things should be. But that would also mean big finance from car loans and big auto from repairs and costs, big insurance from legal fees of cars, and big energy sector from oil / gas / polymers / etc would all lose from less resources used. So they pressured the shit out of government to change things for the worse. Hopefully it gets better soon before I get too old to benefit from it.

BRT is a very good use case for this, where if rail is too expensive per mile to maintain from ridership you can still have a fast connection with 15 minute headways or better.

It’s popular because it’s cheap and fast to implement, so much so that latin american cities all over have been having massive success with them despite a limited budget. Unfortunately where I’m at the political fight has gotten so bad that they are cancelling bus lanes with lame duck reasoning such as “the paint is too expensive to maintain” and “we need more lanes for general traffic to sit in traffic in”.

And yet there is no comment on the random acts of violence on the streets of New York. Road rage, violence against people walking around, engaging with the same crazies/junkies/homeless on the roadways. And don’t even get me started on the number of road head going on.

All I know is [there were more than 39,000 fatalities in the country in 2022 involving motor vehicles, of which 27,000 were drivers or passengers inside a vehicle](there were more than 39,000 fatalities in the country in 2022 involving motor vehicles, of which 27,000 were drivers or passengers inside a vehicle). It’s okay you can click the link, those are numbers straight from the government. Comparatively there appears to have been 356 air-vehicle related fatalities, 26 bus occupants, and 88 under other transit related for the same year. Statistically I’m going to feel safer on the train than I will on the highway.

And even then if you still don’t see yourself riding on there, you should still support it! Support it so that people like me are riding that instead of driving, meaning I am one less car in front of you and one less car in traffic that you have to deal with :)

I’d like to wish a merry fuck you to the sore on the inside of my mouth that has been a goddamn fire the last few days. Fuck cankersores nothing seems to be touching it.

American companies being welfare queens, imagine that.

Ground beef has been creeping up too, I’m honestly curious at what point does Beyond / “Impossible” brands start breaking even.

Really it’s not that hard, I’ve started making it myself. Hardest part is getting ingredients together and following recipe for the dough. Literally just flour, a packet of yeast, water, oil, a few other common items most kitchens should already have if you cook other stuff. Then the pizza sauce, mozzarella, and pepperoni which I already buy made from the grocery store.

Check chatgpt for recipe suggestions, figure out how much dough you need and scale the recipe accordingly, make it and go. Compared to LC I’m barely breaking even though, their deal is just too good lol. But outside of that it’s fun to make at home and I prefer that now over frozen pizzas.

Man I wish the frosty tag thing was a thing at mine. It is but it basically isn’t. If you order online and order a physical keychain they won’t give you one then try to argue about it when you ask where is my keychain I paid for it. Ask me how I know 😂

They did offer an in-app version too, but then you’re stuck choosing between app coupons so you’re basically either already using the $2 off a combo like I was or getting the frosty that costs about the same. So in my case it didn’t save me any money :/

At least they aren’t five freaking bucks like other fast food places are doing with cold treats.

Happened to me as well. Turns out they no likey if you use a VPN and will ban you for it.

There’s little hacks for certain foods too if you can’t cook worth much or don’t want to bother to. For example I don’t want to bother with cooking a chicken, so I’ll go get one hot off the rotisserie chicken counter at Walmart or HEB. $6 for a whole ass chicken already hot cooked and ready to go, take it home and shred it. If it’s hot the skin and legs taste good as a snack of itself while you’re processing it and you can hand shred the breast / thighs / etc and save it for using in meals. It’s how I make quesadillas or chicken alfredo really quickly.

It sounds silly, but when I’m on business trips I almost really like the Darden style restaurants for this reason. Think like Olive Garden, Chili’s etc. Sure it isn’t great food but damn is it a lot for a little. I’ve gotten a big ass bag of chips dipping sauce on top of burgers fries dessert for about the same as a small meal from Taco bell and a quesadilla from there. It’s almost double the amount of food for the same price, and they’re almost easier to deal with because they now all have online ordering. Place the order online as I’m about to leave work, go stop on the way and go pick it up, done deal and I got something for the next day too. I almost prefer takeout style restaurants like this now over “fast” food that’s anything but in their drive thru line.

I’m gonna agree that cleaning sucks ass, as does the time of it.

I made do by usually having to have something stimulating my dopamine-addicted ADHD ass while I’m washing dishes. Youtube documentary video, podcast, whatever is at least 30 minutes so I can just grind thru. Upgrade the dish tools as well, I really like these ikea dish brushes so much more than a sponge because I feel like I can actually clean with it and not constantly go through sponges, and replaced the flip top dish soap with one of those squeeze bottle ones. Big secret is you can refill those with whatever you want, you don’t have to buy a new one when you run out.

Yes there is still the time factor with cooking, but I like to cook enough that I can make 2-4 servings so it’s more like cook once and minimal work for the reheating. Also as for the time, idk how it is in your area, but where I’m at ever since COVID drive thru and in store times suck ass now for ordering. If you’re on an hour lunch break or on the way home where I’m at it always takes them 30 minutes or even longer to get my order ready from ordering to out the lot. At that point, I might as well just go home and cook the damn thing myself, that’s what set it for me.

Lastly for food waste, a few things learning to change how much you make so that you “use up” the materials is helpful. Same with freezing things, turns out most things can be frozen and thawed with minimal change to the item. For example I now buy bacon in a bulk pack but split it up into bags of 4 slices, keep all in freezer except one. Now I would only have four slices going bad instead of the whole package. A few other things I do is sometimes dried herbs / seasonings in a shaker are better than fresh ones that will go bad, learn what you use less of so you buy less (like I only buy eggs in a six pack because I don’t go through enough), etc.

Stick with easy meals. I really want to make a cajun red beans and rice sometime, but I looked at the list of what I need and said fuuuuck that. I’ve got a few easy to make items that I like to rotate through: homemade pizza, mac and cheese and hot dogs, got frozen burger patties and a george foreman, burritos with ground beef beans and canned hatch green chile, etc. I also get my groceries delivered, it helps me time and money wise because I’m not shopping in the moment and only buying what I need, and now the whole process of grocery store shopping that I hate is gone. No more traffic to the store, no parking lot spot searching, no walking around the whole store and dodging slow people stopping in the middle of the aisle to have a conversation, no bullshit line for checkout or receipt checks and packing / leaving. Now it’s literally just order only what I need and it shows up at my door.

I do like the idea of “take home meals” though, sometimes that just hits the spot I get it. For me sometimes I’ll do that and just get some store made chips and queso and fuck it I’m eating that while being a couch potato that night. Don’t let perfection be the enemy of good enough :)

Their burgers are bomb AF, I’ll admit that, but my two complains from them are 1) they’re small, we’re used to big Whataburgers here so I practically have to get two of them and 2) their fries, yes it’s oversaid but their fries are just different and not always in a good way. Though I will say they do taste better if you get a salt packet and pour it on.

Where I’m at it’s definitely very restaurant dependent. Papa Racist’s (Papa John’s) and Pizza Butt (Pizza Hut) I avoid like the plague because their decisions have been jack up the price and nosedive the quality. Meanwhile Little Ceasar’s is doing a $6 lunch combo and most pies I get there are usually $6-10.

I get it it’s Little Ceasar’s, but I got one thing to say to the LC haters

Honestly I don’t think I’ve ate at Mcdonald’s in the last six months now that I think about it. The enshittification of their app deals, price hikes, quality going down, the whole disease outbreak thing, just really turned me off of them. I know they had a bad quarter recently I hope they have another bad one 🤣