BigT

It definitely is time for a relevant 3rd party. I would change my affiliation in a heartbeat.

Read this on facebook and had a good laugh.
So, there is a lot of talk about kids identifying as cats or dogs “furries”, and this is hilarious. . Imagine if you can, that one of my boys told me they thought they were a cat? Sitting at the supper table son says: “Dad, I think I’m a cat! Dad: “No son, you’re a boy! “ My son: “No dad some of my friends at school identify as cats, they call themselves furries, and so do I !! It’s my right and you can’t do anything about it!” Dad: “OK!! “ My son: “Hey, where’s my supper? “ Dad: “Your supper is in the catfood bowl in the corner. Now get off the table you mangy cat!” My son: “What???” Dad: hits him with a broom, “get off the table furball!!” My son in the corner looking bewildered! Me to my wife : “Is that cat neutered”?? My wife: “I will make an appointment!! “ My son: “What??? “ Dad: “Your mother and I have decided we don’t want a house cat, so get out to the barn and hunt mice!” My son: “What???” Dad: brandishes broom, “NOW, to the barn you stupid cat!!” My son: “Dad, I think I’m a boy!” Dad: “I thought so, now sit down and eat your supper!!” Spay and neuter these animals. Stop them from reproducing. Today’s society has enough fruit loops already. End of story!

Runner, you have been making excellent posts I am glad you are here,  I am not a religious person but I believe there are plenty of non religious people who would make a good neighbor just like a religious person. 

Thank you for the kind words! Based on your posts, it seems that you place a high value on freedom and truth. Toward that, I promise you that knowing God and following Jesus would bring more freedom and truth into your life than anything else that you have pursued up until this point. Contrary to the world view, God wants us to be free!

You are completely correct!  God gave us freedom and also guidance to help make that freedom continual.  We have the freedom to grow, multiply and enjoy the fruits of our efforts.  We are also warned of the problems/destruction of not following His guidance.  Earth is not a cage where we would be controlled and fruitless, it's a wilderness of wonders which we can use endlessly and within reasonable limits.
Someone who follows maps well will probably have a great journey and arrive at the destination full of the knowledge and experiences of the journey.  Those who are careless or defiant will arrive but with all kinds of pain and problems instead of the good things that were intended for God's children.  It's our choice what we get from our freedom.
You can't grow without assets.  What we do with them is our own decision, it's not God's punishment.

SPECIAL EDITION ARTICLE #1 - November 17th, 2022 by Fr. Ben Daghir One Thing, Jesus Christ
  This article is a special edition for "One Thing, Jesus Christ." Fr. Ben Daghir recently attended the Notre Dame vs. Navy football game. He, along with his friends, were very motivated to see the thousands of young people who have dedicated their lives to service and mission in the Navy.
  ARTICLE: I recently had the opportunity to attend the Notre Dame vs. Navy football game in Baltimore, Maryland. I went to the game with some friends that I had studied with at St. Mary’s Seminary & University in Baltimore.
  The experience motivated my group of friends and me (all of us are either priests or are studying to become priests). As a result, I would like to share what exactly motivated us in our priestly vocations.
  We saw thousands of young individuals dressed in their Navy uniforms. We watched as these Navy service men and women marched into the stadium and out onto the field.
  We saw young, dedicated and inspired people. The jumbo screen often showed the members of the Navy in the stands laughing and cheering. The jumbo screen also displayed their ages: 18, 19, 20, and 21 years old.
  These individuals from the Navy have set aside their private plans and have embraced a much greater call in life. They have let go of selfish ambitions to join a far greater mission. They have embraced obedience and service in a very radical way. They have focused on purpose, tradition, sacrifice, and mission. They see themselves in a much larger story than their own narrative.   And, based upon their smiles and laughter, their commitment to the demands of the Navy has not limited their freedom but rather unleashed it. In fact, they strike me as very happy people.
  One of my favorite moments occurred during the second half of the game. We watched as roughly a dozen young individuals took “The Oath of Enlistment” from the United States Secretary of the Navy, Carlos Del Toro. These individuals stated, "I, (name), do solemnly swear that I will support and defend the Constitution of the United States against all enemies, foreign and domestic; that I will bear true faith and allegiance to the same; and that I will obey the orders of the President of the United States and the orders of the officers appointed over me, according to regulations and the Uniform Code of Military Justice. So help me God."   These words reminded me of the promises that I made as a priest to the bishop. I promised to discharge without fail the office of the priesthood. I promised to exercise the ministry of the Word worthily and wisely, preaching the Gospel and teaching the Catholic faith. I promised to celebrate faithfully and reverently, in accord with the Church’s tradition, the mysteries of Christ (especially the Eucharist and Reconciliation). I promised to observe the command to pray for God’s people without ceasing. I promised to be united more closely every day to Christ the High Priest. I also promised respect and obedience to my bishop and his successors.
  This Notre Dame vs. Navy football game reminded my friends and me of a great verse in the Bible, “As iron sharpens iron, so one person sharpens another” (Proverbs 27:17). The Navy men and women had no idea that their witness and commitment were motivating us to be greater seminarians and priests. They had no idea that they were challenging us to return to the core of our vocation as a priest: like the bread which becomes the Body of Christ - to be broken for others, like the wine which becomes the Blood of Christ - to be poured out for others.
  ======================== Fr. Ben Daghir is a priest for the Diocese of Erie. He is a graduate of Elk County Catholic High School in Saint Marys, Saint Vincent College in Latrobe, and St. Mary's Seminary & University in Baltimore, Maryland. He considers writing one of his favorite hobbies.   Picture: Members of the Navy during the pregame of the Notre Dame vs. Navy football game in Baltimore, Maryland on November 12, 2022.

THROWBACK THURSDAY: Donor of Maple Avenue Nurses Home
by Clearfield County Historical Society    Thursday, March 17, 2022   in Features, Local News, Top Stories    0    0 Share on FacebookShare on Twitter     Phebe Tyler was born April 10, 1843, the daughter of David and Isabelle (Mahaffey) Tyler.
The village of Tyler was named for her father, one of the pioneers of this section of the Bennetts Branch Valley. The family moved to Clearfield County, settling here in Huston Township in 1848.
Miss Tyler was a woman of broad education and thought. Realizing that his family should have a good education her father employed a governess for his daughters, and Miss Phebe learned to speak French and German with fluency.
Phebe’s greatest accomplishment was in building the Nurses’ Memorial Home for the Maple Avenue Hospital in DuBois in 1923.  Tyler initially donated $15,000, which was later found to be insufficient so she contributed more.
She continued to manage the project until it was completed, even though she was confined to her bed.
Miss Tyler also contributed greatly to welfare and charity.  She was an active member of the Presbyterian Church of Penfield and in her own community. 
She organized the first Sunday School in her town, which was held in a sawmill and later donated land for a church with the only stipulation being that it could not be taken over by one denomination. She later raised funds with her friends’ help in order to construct a building on the land. 
She was liberal in her contributions to welfare work, not only organized work, but she contributed to the education of ambitious young men and women to assist them in their higher education.
Her contributions to welfare and charity were widespread.  No one ever went by her home who was in need that was not helped. 
After her father’s death in 1882, the burden of looking after the financial interests of the family fell on her shoulders.
(The land Mr. Tyler had bought became very valuable on account of timber.) She also succeeded her father as postmaster at Tyler for 13 years.
Miss Tyler always did her own thinking and followed her own thoughts.  She always knew what she wanted and insisted upon having it that way.  She kept entire control of her business affairs up to the last. 

My boy works there, started back in November at $15.50.  He works 10-12hr shifts for 36hrs a week, mostly weekends with an occasional weekday.

Brookville company in the middle of growing streetcar popularity among major cities
LOCAL NEWS by: Yanni Tragellis
Posted: Jul 14, 2021 / 07:16 PM EDT / Updated: Jul 14, 2021 / 07:16 PM EDT   SUBSCRIBE NOW
JEFFERSON COUNTY, Pa. (WTAJ) – The streetcar is back in style. And according to Brookville Equipment Corporation, an area company that manufactures the form of transportation, they have seen a spike in business recently.
Brookville Equipment Corp. has designed streetcars for more than 100 years. Today, modern streetcars line the streets in cities like Dallas, Detroit, Oklahoma City, and Milwaukee. Six more streetcars will head to Arizona this year, as well as an additional five will be off to Tacoma. Two more are destined for Portland, Oregon in the near future.
A streetcar built by Brookville Equipment Corp. located in Oklahoma City, OK. (Courtesy: Brookville Equipment Corp.) The company has also previously designed 120 historic streetcars, which can be found in more than a dozen cities across the country. Throughout all the years, although the styles have changed, Joel McNeil the VP of business development at Brookville Equipment Corp said one thing has stayed the same.
“The product itself has changed quite drastically now with these fancy modern streetcars. But that common thing has been rail,” McNeil said.
He adds that Brookville Equipment is solidifying itself as a major player in the ever-growing streetcar industry. But unlike many of the major international corporations, the small Jefferson county business has always done things in its own unique way.
“An engineer that is designing a part… in a year from then gets to actually walk out and see that being produced on the floor. And that’s something special for someone in the engineering field,” McNeil said.
A streetcar in the process of being designed by Brookville Equipment Corp. It will be delivered to Tempe, Arizona later this year. The process is quite lengthy. Initial design work can take months.
“We make sure that our overall dimensions are correct the seating capacity is what they want the operator control,” said Ron Smith, a project manager, Brookville Equipment Corp. who has overseen both the historic and modern “Liberty NXT” models. “So we work very closely with the customer and their consulting agencies to get it the way they want it.”
Once all the details are ironed out – then it’s time to get to work.
“Once we have the drawings released and get going with the raw materials cars can get built here in just a few months,” Smith said.
Once the current orders for the modern “Liberty NXT” streetcars ship, there will be a total of 36 of these sleek, modern streetcars in U.S. cities. As the demand for streetcars grows across the country… the need for people to manufacture and design them grows as well. Brookville Equipment is currently hiring positions all across the board. McNeil added as the number of streetcars manufactured in Brookville grows, the personal connection with each one is still there.
“It makes you proud when you go to a city and you see something that was built from our local area,” McNeil said.                                                       SEE VIDEO REPORT  ;   https://www.wearecentralpa.com/news/local-news/brookville-company-in-the-middle-of-growing-streetcar-popularity-among-major-cities/

I think it was in the mid 70’s because my sister in law worked there then. 
The DuBois Area Historical Society has City Directories that go back to the early 20th century.

This is the time of year where we give our PowerPoint presentations to the big wheels, show them what changes we have made that are going to make us better the following year. I have an entire slide devoted to one topic. We were finally allowed to make drastic cuts in one specific area, and after only 8 months there is a noticeable difference in not only stability, but also a reduction in costs associated with the after effects of that material once it is placed in the landfill. 
These changes were not made just at my site, but were mandatory nationwide, with severe penalties for anyone violating the new policies. It will never be said out loud, but there is not a doubt in my mind that the ripples that caused these changes originated from a little mountain town in PA.
Thank you for making noise

Very true. And y'all got a new pet monkey

It would be hard to pay for entertainment like you found here.

I'm sure that we all agree that you had the best of intentions and we appreciate the knowledge that you shared in helping us understand how this tragedy happened and how it could have been avoided. You are not to blame for anything at all, you've been a breath of fresh air with a great sense of humor that the vast majority of members appreciate. 

50% reduction in intake of a certain waste stream.
$150-200K/ month reduction in revenue
That material still has to go somewhere, and whoever will take it will be able to charge more per ton because disposal sites are becoming limited. I'm referencing one facility, and this reduction is taking place in... let's just say more than 2...
There's a lot of money there for the taking. Someone will take it. It's time for someone to look at the generators, look at how this stuff is solidified, and make the generators dry it out. Class 3 landfills are the best place we have to dispose of this stuff, but they don't have the equipment or the material to change the composition of it. Landfills are the destination, they accept and contain the waste. There has to be some kind of consistent regulation to require the generators to make this material safe for a landfill. They aren't purposely creating a material that is this hazardous, it just meets the current criteria, passes the current tests required to enter a landfill. The problem is there is more of it than ever before, and as more and more municipalities push recycling, there is less MSW to mix with it. The percentage of wet waste to MSW continues to climb, and that is what makes a landfill dangerous. If it were solidified a different way, with a more porous material that made it drier and facilitated drainage, then I wouldn't have a problem with it.
When landfills slide, or you have a catastrophic event like Greentree, everyone looks at the landfill. Mistakes were made, no doubt, but if that material was dry in the first place maybe that wouldn't have happened.

So the anniversary came and went.  I didn't see any stories on the TV or in the paper.  Tomorrow is the anniversary of the funeral.  Dedicate a moment of peace.  A moment without anger and bitterness.  Keep Billy and those who survived the tragedy in your thoughts.

It has to catch the attention of someone outside of the landfills. These giant national waste companies are built around the trucks, the landfills are the destination no one thinks about. Its all waste, it all makes money. We get paid to pick it up and dump it. Unless you are in the landfill, you don't see what we are actually dumping, and landfill employees are less than 10% of the company's employees. The bonus structure is flawed, because it rewards 90% of the employees for punishing 10%. It's not even that they are doing it on purpose, most of them don't even know.
I will say that my company is pushing hard towards much more strict limits on what we can take, but not without pushback. It's also a voluntary move, so if we don't take it, that means it has to go somewhere. Someone will take that revenue, and the current laws regarding solidification aren't sustainable. I'm a conservative, I don't like a lot of regulation, but it's time for something to be done. This waste has to be disposed of. Class 3 landfills are the best place to dispose of it. Instead of relying solely on engineers and "wet waste studies", start getting the opinions of the blue collar guys that have actually been touching this stuff in the field for 20-30 years. Find out what makes good sludge good, what makes bad sludge bad. Standardize a method of solidification that makes this material safe in a landfill. Set limits on how much a landfill can take, and spread it out among all landfills. 
Heres another thing that hurts certain landfills, and I bet it applies to your area. Say you're a huge company that owns numerous landfills. You have two large landfills within 90 miles of each other, but one is in a town with a population of 1 million people and is right in the middle of town, surrounded by subdivisions, schools, churches, etc... It's the flagship of your company. Your other landfill is the same size, but it's at the end of a lonely road in the middle of nowhere, in a town with a population of 10,000. Which landfill are you going to send all the nasty, sticky, smelly sludge to? Little hint: one landfill is getting 5% sludge, the other is getting 30%.
There needs to be some regulation
 

Very well said LFG, great explanation of how the bonus system works in your location.

Very well said LFG, great explanation of how the bonus system works in your location.

I'm still sad that this story just disappeared, but I hope that with the DEP investigation results released at least maybe the families involved can push a little further.
I'm posting today because it's been almost a year, and I'm reminded how I came to this forum in the first place. Bonuses came out today, and 60% of the bonus is dependent on making operating income budget. We didn't make budget. We reduced one specific waste stream by 20% last year because of it's hazardous nature, and the lost revenue in that one waste stream caused us to miss budget by over $1 million. I'm the lowest bonus eligible person on this particular totem pole, the only one that actually sees or cares what this waste stream does to a landfill, and it cost me personally $9000 this year. That's real money out of my pocket, not some corporate percentage of loss. I know the next 3 guys above me up the line, and they lost $17K, $29K, and $42K of their bonuses because of the lost revenue from this one waste stream. Staying in compliance, no safety violations, no EPA infractions, all of that combines for 40% of the bonus, 60% is making the op income budget. There are many more people further up the line that also lost, and you can bet much more money, and none of them understand why this waste stream was eliminated. To them trash is trash. Salespeople go out and pick up accounts for our trucks to haul, it all goes to the landfill, what's the difference? It all brings in money, we all benefit, right? I was the only one on the conference calls leading up to the decision to reduce this waste stream that was agreeing with the third party engineers that we needed to cut back. People were getting mad at me. This is the first year that I was in a bonus bracket this large, so it is the first time that I have seen that many zeroes erased from a check, but I understand why it was worth it. No one else does, and unless you spend time in one of these landfills and see what this s**t is actually doing to us, there is no way you could understand.
That's why I pushed this story so hard, that's why I made so much noise about a little mountain town a thousand miles away that I didn't even know how to pronounce. There were no nefarious motives, there was an opportunity to shine a spotlight on an aspect of an industry that affects people all over the country. To the friends and family of Billy, the guys at my landfill continue to remember you in their thoughts and prayers, and to the guys still working... Be safe

From what I hear this story is not over. The last I heard DEP had another driller in taking samples. I wanted to post today because I actually met with one of our sludge producers this week for the first time at their facility, and I have a better understanding of where it comes from, how it is solidified, and why certain materials have to be used. This will be kind of a long and boring post, but for anyone wondering what sludge actually is I will try and explain it.
Wastewater treatment sludge is easy to visualize, it's just whatever settles to the bottom of a treatment pond, and it makes up about 40% of our sludge intake. The rest is classified as "industrial sludge", so in my mind it was coming from the back end of a plant as the sludge I see. I asked our hauler if he would give me a tour of the facility, because we have to work with each other on haul times so I'm not bombarded with more than I can handle in a short period of time. Sometimes this puts our hauler in a bind, so I wanted to see what he was up against. I was surprised to learn that his facility isn't producing the sludge, he is taking liquid waste from all kinds of industry, solidifying it, then sending it to the landfill. When I say liquid waste, I mean almost any liquid you can think of. Oil, ammonia, shampoo, milk, all different kinds of liquid chemicals. He said almost every manufacturing process produces liquid waste on some level. His facility receives these liquids and what can be recycled, like oil, is recycled. All other liquids are hauled in tankers, or in 50-100 gallon totes. These liquids are dumped into a "solidification pit", a concrete lined pit about 15ftx15ftx10ft deep. The next step is to add a binding agent, and this is where the dangers of sludge in a landfill begin. Sawdust is commonly used, and I love it, but the problem with using sawdust is it doesn't totally bind the liquid. If only sawdust was used, the trucks would leak from the facility all the way to the landfill, about 45 miles away, so other binding agents have to be added. One option is a cottony looking material that soaks up the liquids, and that works for me because the liquid is squeezed back out in the landfill by the weight of the equipment and the weight of the trash stacked on top of it. Picture it like a saturated sponge. The problem there is you still risk trucks leaking en route, so another agent they use is binding polymers, basically powders that lock the liquids. This is the stuff that makes sludge so hard to handle, so dangerous if it isn't mixed properly. The very thing that makes it safe to haul is what makes it dangerous in a landfill. It's not like a sponge, it doesn't release the water. It never dries and stabilizes, and if too much is placed in one area it makes an impervious layer that will trap other liquids either above or under that layer, creating those invisible underground ponds that I've described before.
This is why I want the story of Greentree to come out. If it is proven that sludge was responsible for that collapse, the waste industry needs to take a long look at what it is, and what it is doing to us. Liquid waste will always be generated, and it has to go somewhere. Modern landfills are the best option we have at this time, but the workers in those landfills have to be protected. When "wet waste" studies are done, they are done by engineers, and those results are shared with upper management. The field operators are not brought in to the discussion. Things that look good on paper don't necessarily translate to good practice in the field. One of my engineers came to me after one of those studies, excited to tell me they had proven that the "moisture retention capabilities" of the polymers were very high. To the people watching the bottom line, what that means is less leachate generation, less liquid at the bottom of the landfill that has to be hauled off and treated. An engineer doesn't think about what this waste that never dries does to the surfaces we work on every day, and how those initial savings in leachate generation turn into expense exponentially for years and years after the waste is dumped. You have to dig up bad areas and repair them, you have slides that if not repaired turn into exactly what happened at Greentree. You have odor issues because of gas migration, and lawsuits have been settled for millions of dollars with neighboring communities. The biggest issue of all is the instability it causes, and the dangerous conditions employees have to work in if it is not handled properly. There needs to be a national discussion about how this liquid waste can be safely disposed of. You can't dump free liquids in a landfill, so it will always have to be solidified in some fashion. I want the industry, regardless of the company you work for, to take a look at this issue and make common sense decisions that include input from the people that actually have to handle this material. It can't be fixed by a spreadsheet.
If the Greentree collapse doesn't get everyone's attention, then nothing will. If it is swept under the rug and disappears quietly, it will happen again

I had pm'd him a friend's phone number who has a lot of Brewery items.
The researcher did respond and thanked me for the number. 
 

I had pm'd him a friend's phone number who has a lot of Brewery items.
The researcher did respond and thanked me for the number. 
 

Have you actually used these laws or are you just expressing your opinion?  I have been on both sides of labor-management issues and negotiations and seen these laws used more than once.  The results always favor the employee when the employee is acted against without additional proof of misconduct or some other allowable firing offense.  In those cases where the company prevails they have proven other causes that would have resulted in firing under a union shop also.  The only time these laws don't work for otherwise good employees is when they don't use them for their benefit.

Cabbage is doing great.
I love the purple ones.
My wife said she is going to cook them and make me eat it since I planted it. I don't like cabbage.   Except for pigs in a blanket.
I just like planting different stuff and seeing how it does.
My wife is planning on making sauerkraut with the other ones.
Cauliflower is doing well.

 
Cauliflower is doing well.

 
and so are the tomatoes.