samhexum

One of my local stores emails me copies of my receipts. Thursday night, almost exactly 5 1/2 days after I went shopping there, they sent me a receipt from Saturday. I was supposed to get a package of McCain Quick Fries for free. They were NOT free… The store paid me to take them. When looking at the receipt quickly at the store, I thought the adjustments they made to the price of the fries included my one dollar in grocery bucks, but that dollar was taken off at the bottom of the receipt. They charged me $5.49 for the fries, then took off $4.99, then took off another $1.50. As a result, I paid 549 and they reimbursed me 649, in addition to the one dollar in grocery bucks I had deducted at the end of my receipt.

When you're grabbing a bottle of Coca-Cola during a grocery run, you're likely not paying any attention to the color of the bottle's lid. Because why would you? It turns out that for soda lovers, there's a very specific reason why the color of your Coca-Cola bottle top matters, especially this time of year. Soda-loving history buffs likely know that back in the 1980s, Coca-Cola swapped out real cane sugar for corn syrup in the United States, and it's been that way ever since. Well, at least for the most part. On Instagram, Kevin Escalera (@snackeatingsnackss) shared an amazing tip on how you can get Coca-Cola made using real cane sugar, without having to hunt for a bottle imported from Mexico. This special formula is available every year—but only for a limited time. Escalera revealed that during Passover, if you spot a bottle of Coca-Cola with a yellow cap, that means it's sweetened with real cane sugar. "They do this during a very short time a year around Passover because interestingly, Kosher Jewish people can't have corn during the Passover time. So Coke makes a special real sugar edition just like the Mexican Coke version that you know and love that you pay extra for," he explained. The yellow cap Coca-Colas have even gotten the attention of Reddit, where one inquiry about the bottles has received dozens of responses. "It’s true. Corn syrup isn’t kosher," shared one person. "Is in very limited supply and usually targeted to big box stores in areas with larger Jewish populations." Each year, during the eight days of Passover, those who take part adhere to a specific diet. And because of the "limited supply" factor, one commenter on Escalera's Instagram post suggested that people take it easy on stocking up on the yellow-topped bottles of Coke if they aren't taking part in Passover. "But also can you not?" they wrote. "It’s super limited—let us Jews have like one good thing for Passover!"

Probably Pirates of Penzance... it was the only movie Linda Ronstadt made and they were still dating at the time.

Sorry, but how can any list like this not include the former governor of California's naked booty?

I didn't mean to imply that it was. It was a number that involved the whole cast and I enjoyed it so much that I have kept listening to it all these years.

Park Slope School’s Pet Chicken Dies Despite $2K in Vet Bills

I have one of the songs on my computer. I think it was the biggest production number: SMASH - 1001 Nights.wav

Chisox were shut out seven times in their first seventeen games last year. They just came within a two out solo home run of winning 8-0. BREAK UP THE SOX!

YOU'RE WELCOME!!! P.S. She broke up with him shortly after. They only dated 3 months; she calls him 'baseball boy' and said he was a hot mess and the relationship was toxic. I couldn't find a link to post it, but I saw a video in which she spoke about him sending her a package of pics of them and one of his shirts sprayed with his cologne and a note saying he'd been in therapy. She wasn't persuaded.

Tyler Wade didn't make the Padres. He needs a job. I'll give him one. Or two. Or 69.

ON THIS DAY IN TV HISTORY 20 years ago, Grey's Anatomy premiered on ABC, airing Sundays at 10 pm as a midseason replacement for Boston Legal. Nine episodes aired, with the other four saved for Season 2 once ABC realized it had a monster hit on its hands.

He was on an episode of Emergency! Then after that episode, he decided to leave showbiz and he became a paramedic in real life. He went on to become a paramedic trainer for the LA County Police Academy and then became a deputy sheriff. He retired in 2017 and started doing nostalgia shows and conventions.

Bobby Sherman has stage 4 cancer. His wife announced on Facebook he would no longer be doing conventions or Cameos. He's 81.

Queens Center Mall is undergoing a significant expansion and renovation effort as it welcomes a wave of new retailers and continues to experience increased foot traffic—part of a broader national resurgence in in-person shopping. The shopping center has added several high-profile tenants, including San Wei, Psycho Bunny, Digiso, Dave’s Hot Chicken, Poke Island, Burlington, Primark and H&M. Two additional retailers— Dossier and PacSun—are scheduled to open in the coming months. For many of these brands, including San Wei, Psycho Bunny, Dossier, and Primark, the Queens Center location will be their first and only storefront in the borough. The additions come as indoor mall visitation increased by 5.5% in January 2025 compared to January 2024, with February 2025 visits holding steady and spiking on Valentine’s Day. Alongside the new tenant lineup, Queens Center is also in the midst of internal and external renovations. Completed upgrades include new carpeting, lighting fixtures, and updated common area seating. Live greenery installations and parking garage improvements are currently underway.

This Brooklyn apartment complex was built like a Lego set The building will be affordable housing for seniors; it was designed using passive house principles and was constructed from modular units. When construction started on a new affordable apartment building in Brooklyn, most of the work on the site happened very quickly. Instead of typical construction, cranes lifted giant modular units into the air—each made up of two separate apartments, plus the corridor between them—and set them into place. Trucks delivered nearly four dozen 60-foot-long “mods” from the factory where they were built in Pennsylvania, staging them next to a nearby cemetery in the Brooklyn neighborhood of East Flatbush. Then, each day for two weeks, construction crews stacked together as many as six of the units to build the complex, called Bethany Terraces. (The massive size of the units made them more challenging to transport than a single modular apartment at a time, but the configuration helped shrink the time for installation on site.) The apartments were essentially 100% complete inside. (Appliances were strapped to the corridors and just had to be slid into place.) The crew only had to weld the units together and connect wiring and plumbing from each apartment to the hallway. After all of the units were attached, the crew added continuous insulation to the outside and finished other elements like the roof. A project of this size, with 57 apartments and four stories, could have taken 30 months to build, says Yolanda do Campo, director of construction at RiseBoro, the nonprofit developer behind the project. Instead, it took only 22 months. A shorter timeline means significant savings. “Less construction time means fewer months of interest payments,” do Campo says. Interest payments for the project average around $100,000 a month. It also means, of course, that residents can start moving in faster. In this case, the apartments are limited to seniors in New York City’s affordable housing lottery, with a percentage of the units reserved for seniors who were previously homeless. The process has still taken time, in part because of the bureaucracy involved with the housing lottery. The building was completed last fall; the first residents started moving in in January and only a handful live there so far. But faster construction helped. As builders gain more experience in modular construction, it could happen even more quickly. “I really do think that we do this a couple more times and we’re seeing a building come in 15, 16 months, which is somewhat unheard of for something like this,” says Grayson Jordan, principal at Paul A. Castrucci Architects, the architecture firm behind the building’s design. While modular apartment buildings are starting to become more common in cities, the project went a step further with a “passive house” design, meaning that it has ultra-low energy demand. The building is well-insulated and airtight. The hot water system runs on a heat pump. The apartments are all-electric and designed to run on solar power, so the building can get as close to net zero energy use as possible. “RiseBoro pays for some of the utilities of the tenants,” says do Campo. “So being passive house and saving energy is critical to the business model—besides contributing to sustainability, we lower the monthly bills.” RiseBoro has pioneered energy-efficient design in other projects, including adding sleek new facades to aging apartment buildings to help them shrink energy use by 80%. Outside, the south side of the building has stepped terraces instead of a flat wall, creating a series of outdoor community spaces for residents and more space for solar panels. There was a learning curve to using modular construction; since the local construction crew didn’t have expertise working with modular units, Riseboro had to help coordinate between the factory and the crew on the ground. But it will get easier in the future, Jordan says. “I see a way forward where this becomes just normal construction,” he says. “It does not seem like rocket science. It just seems like, OK, well, you did this the first time. Let’s work out the kinks.” There are some other potential cost advantages to doing most of the work in a factory offsite. Labor in the Pennsylvania factory is less expensive. And crews can build the modular units year-round without delays because of bad weather. Jordan hopes that it also will become standard for larger affordable apartment buildings. “I think it really makes a lot of sense,” he says. “It’s just a matter of really getting the people who make the decisions comfortable with the idea of building a little bit differently than they’re used to . . . I think we all know that there’s a great need for affordable housing, and this is one of several tools that I think could be powerful in meeting that challenge.” fastcompany.com WWW.FASTCOMPANY.COM

I can't believe I just noticed that Oz on high potential is played by the same actor who plays Chris on ghosts.

I can't believe I just noticed that Oz on high potential is played by the same actor who plays Chris on ghosts.

DEAR ABBY: I’m 29, and my boyfriend is 36. We met on a dating site and were together for three years. He broke up with me two months ago because he didn’t think he could marry me. (We weren’t engaged.) He says I’m the love of his life, soulmate and his dream come true, and I feel the same, but he has commitment issues. When I met him, I was in the process of getting divorced and ending an abusive marriage. He was the best boyfriend, and, to us, our relationship was perfect. But his commitment issues gave him doubt that I’m the one he’s supposed to be with. I truly believe that God put him in my life. Something told me he was The One. How can I get him to see that we are meant to be and not to give up on the best relationship both of us have ever had? — TRUE SOULMATE IN GEORGIA DEAR SOULMATE FUCKING MORON: I love your sales pitch, but the person who has to buy it is him, and he’s not in the market for a permanent attachment. Believe me, I sympathize, but both partners have to believe the other is “The One,” and the urge to commit appears to be definitely one-sided here. Remember, you met this man as you were getting out of an abusive relationship. He was kind; you pounced. It would be interesting to know if you received any kind of counseling after that prior relationship, because you may need some now to make sure you don’t repeat an unhealthy pattern. THE MAN SEEMS TOO INTELLIGENT TO WASTE HIS TIME WITH AN IDIOT LIKE YOU. GOOD FOR HIM! DEAR ABBY: I was fortunate to learn an uncommon hobby from my grandmother. Because I am the only grandchild who continued the hobby, I inherited her tools. I mainly keep in touch with my extended family (aunts, uncles, cousins) through social media, and, because of that, I post my work from time to time. They have expressed happiness that someone is continuing the hobby, so I want to continue sharing. My problem is that several friends constantly nag me to sell them my items. I work full time, have a large family and volunteer at my kids’ schools, so I have little time to devote to my hobby. Each item takes many hours to complete, and I don’t want to sell them. Also, if I priced them appropriately for the time it takes to produce, the items would be costly. I have told these friends repeatedly that I do this purely as a hobby, yet they continue to bombard my posts with demands that I sell to them. I don’t want to “unfriend” these people. They are my friends and in other respects are wonderful. How can I get my message across to them? — CRAFTY IN PENNSYLVANIA DEAR CRAFTY: Tell your friends you are complimented that they would like to buy your creations, but after spending the amount of time you do creating them, they become like your “children.” Point out that you would no more sell them than one of your kids, and they are not and never will be for sale. Say it with a smile, or a smile emoji. But do not relent. If the requests keep coming, limit with whom you share these images (i.e., only relatives). FROM THE BUSINESS END OF A DOUBLE BARRELLED SHOTGUN DEAR ABBY: My husband puts everyone first before me. An example: We were invited to his aunt Diana’s 50th wedding anniversary. His father was their best man but couldn’t make it due to illness. So, at the last minute, my husband was asked to sit at the head table with his aunt and her husband. I was not invited to do that, and my husband didn’t ask if I could sit with them. The room was full and there were no other seats for me, so the event coordinator set up a table for me in the hall, by myself, next to the washrooms. The only time I saw anyone was when they used the facilities. My husband came to use the washroom and asked me if I wanted anything. I told him I’d like a drink, but he didn’t come back until he needed to use the washroom again. I told him to take me home and he could return to the event. It was a 15-minute drive. When I talked to him the next day and explained how hurt and embarrassed I was, he thought it was selfish on my part since it was such a special event for his aunt Diana. I was supportive of him taking part, but if it had been the reverse, I would have ensured he was seated at the main table, or at least close by. What are your thoughts? — CAST OUT IN FLORIDA DEAR CAST OUT: What happened at your husband’s aunt’s anniversary celebration was an embarrassment for everybody. If you and your husband were invited as a couple, there should have been an assigned seat for you at one of the tables. You should not have been seated alone next to a bathroom. The event coordinator has plenty to apologize for, and so does your thoughtless, self-centered husband. Under the circumstances, your hurt feelings are understandable. You owe no one an apology for feeling rightfully offended. FLUSH HIM DEAR ABBY: Am I a crank, or is it OK these days for waiters to become involved in diners’ conversations and actually take over the conversation? At dinner last night, our waiter interrupted us three times and stayed at our table for more than five minutes, taking over our conversation. It had nothing to do with the restaurant or our food — it was about his travels and all the countries he’s been to and worked in. The last time he interrupted, we had finished eating and were talking. He talked for about 10 minutes. When he finally stopped to take a breath, I quickly said, “Well, let’s get going!” It wasn’t late and the restaurant was more than half empty. I had given him a 50% tip because it was a holiday, but after I thought about the intrusive service, I was sorry I did it. Any suggestions? — BACK OFF OR YOUR TIP WILL SUFFER DEAR BACK OFF: Many people would have enjoyed that server’s sharing. However, because you didn’t, when his patter became intrusive, you should have politely said, “Excuse me, we are trying to have a private conversation. Could you please take our order GET THE FUCK OUT OF HERE AND DROP DEAD?” (That you tipped so generously would have softened the blow IS SOMETHING YOU WILL REGRET FOR THE REST OF YOUR LIFE.)

Brett Gardner's 14-year-old son died in his sleep on Friday after he and several relatives fell ill during a family vacation. No other details have been provided.

Twitter bird sign from defunct San Francisco office sold for nearly $35,000 at auction

Sounds of silence Forest Hills Stadium told no concerts this summer as fight over noise with fed-up neighbors hits boiling point NYPD revoked iconic music venue’s sound amplification permits

Her "Am I boring you?" after Jamie yawned was an ad-lib. The yawning was not part of the script.