So trivial, yet it really ticks you off.

HudsonHawk said:

No. That's my point. I think that falls squarely into the common sense category. For me that's a reasonably easy distinction to make.

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HudsonHawk said:

Hey...wait a minute now...



And I'm not suggesting that lead paint is some sort of pariah. But it does come with certain risk. I see no reason to not try to reasonably mitigate that risk.

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No. Not at all. Lead paint is today more of a problem than it was, say, forty years ago. It is interesting to note lead exposure incidence though. Desperately poor children who grow up in shabby old houses with peeling lead paint in the countryside almost never show elevated lead levels. In fact, except where there is lead contamination in plumbing fixtures, elevated childhood lead levels are closely associated with proximity to urban streets and highways which were heavily traveled in the 1950's, 1960's and 1970's. There is heavy lead contamination in many urban soils due to tailpipe exhaust. As old neighborhoods are cleaned up and green space covers bare earth the contaminated dust is slowly being tied to the ground, and over time loose paint will become the primary contaminant.

HudsonHawk said:

Hey...wait a minute now...

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OK. Certain actors in the oil industry. Notably GM, DuPont, Standard Oil of New Jersey and Lubrizol. I was painting with an awfully broad brush.

According to normally reliable sources, traffic deaths in the state of Colorado are up 25 percent over the past two years. A contributing factor would be an increased population traveling an increased number of miles on the public roadways in the state.

But the population and traffic levels haven't increased nearly enough to account for more than a fraction of that 25 percent. It's apparent that something else is at play here, and the likeliest culprit is distracted driving, mostly drivers fiddling with their smartphones while behind the wheel.

In this state it is legal to converse on a handheld phone while driving. It shouldn't be, but it is. Texting isn't allowed, but that legal prohibition doesn't dissuade enough of us.

I heard a state legislator say that she saw no harm in talking or texting while driving, provided the driver exercised "common sense." I heard another legislator say that texting while waiting at a traffic light was just fine in his book, as those drivers waiting behind that driver who is still looking at his smartphone after the light turns green can always honk their horns.

Yes, this is what they said. Must be the thin air.

Live free and die young. And take a few innocents with you.

vitanola said:

No. Not at all. Lead paint is today more of a problem than it was, say, forty years ago. It is interesting to note lead exposure incidence though. Desperately poor children who grow up in shabby old houses with peeling lead paint in the countryside almost never show elevated lead levels. In fact, except where there is lead contamination in plumbing fixtures, elevated childhood lead levels are closely associated with proximity to urban streets and highways which were heavily traveled in the 1950's, 1960's and 1970's. There is heavy lead contamination in many urban soils due to tailpipe exhaust. As old neighborhoods are cleaned up and green space covers bare earth the contaminated dust is slowly being tied to the ground, and over time loose paint will become the primary contaminant.

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Absolutely. Exposure to highway lead has historically been much more of an environmental and human health issue, one we've discussed around here on previous occasions.

My impression was that the hazard of lead paint to children was not eating paint chips fallen from the walls, but from their habit of chewing things like toys, which used to be painted with lead paint. In fact, small children will chew on anything that they can fit into their mouths and that includes furniture, which was often painted.

Our Ms. Maine will certainly approve of a shop space I spotted this afternoon on East Colfax Avenue in Denver which houses a business promoting itself as a place to procure coffee, whiskey, and (get this) "working class fashion."

Gotta have your riveted heavy denim to properly sip your shade-grown arabica and small-batch whiskey.

Alas. Bourgeois cultural appropriation knows no bounds.

The farm I grew up on (as well as the house across the street- the hired hand''s house- and the house down the road) had spring boxes for water before the city pipeline went through in 1900 (landowners were offered free water for the life of the house or $100). Whenever my parents dug 2.5 feet down, they inevitably found lead pipe, once out of about eight digs.

Kind of makes me shudder to think about... you could bend that pipe in your bare hands.

When I was in junior high we had an "Introduction to Chemistry" class where we got to do a lot of interesting experiments, among them one in which we got to make wet-cell batteries using sheet lead, blotting paper, and sodium sulphate. We handled a lot of lead during these experiments, and we used these batteries regularly thruout the rest of the course. We wore no gloves, had no particular hygenic or safety protocols concerning the lead, and I imagine we absorbed our share of it just from the handling.

We were also pretty reckless in our handling of mercury, which we'd pour out of little vials and push around our desk tops with the tip of a pencil.

LizzieMaine said:

When I was in junior high we had an "Introduction to Chemistry" class where we got to do a lot of interesting experiments, among them one in which we got to make wet-cell batteries using sheet lead, blotting paper, and sodium sulphate. We handled a lot of lead during these experiments, and we used these batteries regularly thruout the rest of the course. We wore no gloves, had no particular hygenic or safety protocols concerning the lead, and I imagine we absorbed our share of it just from the handling.

We were also pretty reckless in our handling of mercury, which we'd pour out of little vials and push around our desk tops with the tip of a pencil.

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I recall playing with mercury as well. I don't know where the Old Man got it, but it was just kind of around.

tonyb said:

Our Ms. Maine will certainly approve of a shop space I spotted this afternoon on East Colfax Avenue in Denver which houses a business promoting itself as a place to procure coffee, whiskey, and (get this) "working class fashion."

Gotta have your riveted heavy denim to properly sip your shade-grown arabica and small-batch whiskey.

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LizzieMaine said:

Alas. Bourgeois cultural appropriation knows no bounds.

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Sure, maybe, but even more so, it's so transparent, obnoxious, stupid and insulting that it's unbelievable that anyone could be that tone deaf and ignorant. I'm not really sure of the meaning of "bourgeois" or "cultural appropriation" (although I could use both in a sentence - but I can fake knowledge about a lot of things - a great skill for getting through college), but if there's a "class" of people out there who think that is an appealing way to advertise or are attracted to that ad, then we have nothing to fear from the "bourgeois" or their "cultural appropriation" as they are too stupid to be threatening.

Fading Fast said:

Sure, maybe, but even more so, it's so transparent, obnoxious, stupid and insulting that it's unbelievable that anyone could be that tone deaf and ignorant. I'm not really sure of the meaning of "bourgeois" or "cultural appropriation" (although I could use both in a sentence - but I can fake knowledge about a lot of things - a great skill for getting through college), but if there's a "class" of people out there who think that is an appealing way to advertise or are attracted to that ad, then we have nothing to fear from the "bourgeois" or their "cultural appropriation" as they are too stupid to be threatening.

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It is indeed akin to tone deafness.

I have a friend, a history PhD, whose area of expertise is labor history. He once scratched out a living as an adjunct professor but now works for the union representing adjunct faculty. He does indeed know his subject matter, but he wouldn't know which end of the hammer to pick up. He might be the right guy to organize college faculty members, but he's about as honestly "working class" in his own consciousness as those soft-handed posers peddling "working class fashion." He's just not the guy to reach Joe Sixpack.

Part of being effective in most any endeavor is knowing one's own weaknesses. Don't try to hit the notes outside your range.

Inkstainedwretch said:

My impression was that the hazard of lead paint to children was not eating paint chips fallen from the walls, but from their habit of chewing things like toys, which used to be painted with lead paint. In fact, small children will chew on anything that they can fit into their mouths and that includes furniture, which was often painted.

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That's an obsolete reading of the problem. The modern lead problem involves dust in the home in poorly maintained tenements.

sheeplady said:

The farm I grew up on (as well as the house across the street- the hired hand''s house- and the house down the road) had spring boxes for water before the city pipeline went through in 1900 (landowners were offered free water for the life of the house or $100). Whenever my parents dug 2.5 feet down, they inevitably found lead pipe, once out of about eight digs.

Kind of makes me shudder to think about... you could bend that pipe in your bare hands.

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Lead does not go into solution to any dangerous extent in alkaline water, so it may well have not been a problem with your spring water in Upstate NY.

tonyb said:

It is indeed akin to tone deafness.

I have a friend, a history PhD, whose area of expertise is labor history. He once scratched out a living as an adjunct professor but now works for the union representing adjunct faculty. He does indeed know his subject matter, but he wouldn't know which end of the hammer to pick up. He might be the right guy to organize college faculty members, but he's about as honestly "working class" in his own consciousness as those soft-handed posers peddling "working class fashion." He's just not the guy to reach Joe Sixpack.

Part of being effective in most any endeavor is knowing one's own weaknesses. Don't try to hit the notes outside your range.

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Yep. The best way outsiders can show that they're "down with the struggle" is to get out of the way of those who have a direct stake in its outcome.

vitanola said:

Lead does not go into solution to any dangerous extent in alkaline water, so it may well have not been a problem with your spring water in Upstate NY.

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In general, higher pH reduces the solubility of lead, but higher pH can also accelerate the leaching of lead from brass and lead-tin solder. So depending on what type of lead you have in your pipe, having high alkalinity may or may not exacerbate lead problems. In this case, having an actual lead pipe is probably less of a problem than having lead solder in copper pipes.

Me, my pipes are screwed galvanized steel. At this point, the only thing holding them together is the rust.

belfastboy said:

My great uncle, lost his eyesight in WWll, an ardent Orangeman, walked into a government liquor store (the kind that you wrote your choice on a slip of paper and a clerk behind a counter would fetch the said bottle for you. Now the visual is my uncle walking in, tapping his white cane on the floor handing the slip to the clerk and the clerk reaching up and to his right, wrapping his hand around a bottle of Irish Whiskey. My blind uncle, able to see shadows, knew up and to the right was where the Jameson's is stocked, but my uncle as I stated a true blood Orangeman, barked to the clerk. "Not that fecking Papist Whiskey, get me the bloody Bushmills!" Well apparently the clerk almost dropped the Jamesons startled as he was by a blind man barking directions his way. Me a true son of Ulster will drink any bloody whiskey offered to me.....I truly do not discriminate!

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Heh. I'm sure the old boy would love to know that a significant proportion of exported Jamesons is now bottled in the Bushmills Distillery! I like 'em both myself. Ironically, they're much more alike than a lot of folks would care to believe....

Zombie_61 said:

Yesterday afternoon my wife and I were out running errands, and as we passed a local elementary school she asked, "How did you get to school?" She grew up in the suburbs of Chicago and was bused to school, so she was surprised when I responded, "I walked." The elementary school I attended was only 1/2 mile from our house, the junior high/middle school was only 1 mile away, and the high school was 2 miles away. Fortunately, I was able to take advantage of a wonderful short cut--railroad tracks that ran right next to our house and bypassed all three schools I attended. Occasionally I would use public transportation if it was raining--the local bus route also went right past our house and bypassed two of the three schools--but otherwise I was never driven to school until I got my own car and drove myself. Kids today are wimps.

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Here in London they give the kids free bus passes. THere's an increasing problem where the little varmits get on at one top and off at the next (in my local area this is a distance,. often, of little more than 200 yards. They wait longer for the bus than they could walk it in). Same thing happened today at the opera - a lot of elderly folks had to get out and wait for the next lift because a boatload of tourist kids too lazy to use the stairs had gotten on at the floor above....).

Fading Fast said:

Do we think that all of safety precautions that are now either legally or by society pressure "demanded" of parents is contributing to this drop? These new standards require a much greater time and budgetary commitment from parents than, certainly, my parents made when I was born in '64.
....
Hence, for my parents, and that generation, the time and dollar commitment to having a child was much lower. Do you things some parents today are opting out because of this?

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POssibly, though I wouldn't rule out the availability of reliable contraception and the lessening of cultural condemnation of those of us who choose not to have kids as the most significant factor here. Certainly true, though, that its often the more resonsible people who actually think anbout it and thus choose not to be parents. Far too many people still having kids because it's the done thing, whether or not they wantg them or are equipped to deal with them properly.

Sometimes the least likely parents can surprise you. One of the theatre kids had an unplanned pregnancy when she was 17, and now going on four years later at age 21 is one of the most conscientious parents I've ever seen. She and her fella have both risen to the occasion, both have supportive families and decent jobs, and their little boy is healthy, happy, and looks like he'll have a good future. On the other hand, I know people in their thirties who can't handle raising a dog, let alone a kid.

vitanola said:

Lead does not go into solution to any dangerous extent in alkaline water, so it may well have not been a problem with your spring water in Upstate NY.

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I grew up in the Adirondack Mountains... so the acidic thin soil over a granite base where the blueberries grow.

Although things got a lot worse with acid rain... something I haven't heard anyone worry about living in the southern tier where I live now (limestone and shale base.) My parents had their soil tested in the early 1990s... it returned a pH of 3.

All this lead paint talk reminded me of a "so trivial ..." little corruption event that happened during our renovation. Because our apartment was built in 1928, to get our restoration plan approved by the NYC DOB, we had to have an asbestos inspection.

That seemed reasonable to me as we know it is very dangerous to breath that in and during demolition, we wouldn't want to release that into the air. Of course, we had our fingers crossed that we'd pass as asbestos remediation is very expensive.

The DOB required us to hire a NYC licensed asbestos inspection company for $900 (which I had to pay before he'd come - checked, they all worked this way for the exact same fee) - sounded high to me, but I figured it would be very comprehensive as we were demoing one bathroom, one kitchen and doing some other work throughout that would break into some walls (all of this was on the NYC architect approved plans I had to submit to the DOB before hiring the asbestos inspector - also not cheap).

On the day of the inspection, I met the inspector - nice enough guy - who came into the apartment, took three random one-inch deep wall samples that were not from the rooms being demo'ed. I mentioned this to him, he shrugged, put the samples in a bag, told me I'd get a report in a few weeks and left (was in and out in under 10 minutes).

I "passed" this complete nonsense of an inspection. Any one want to bet that $900 fee isn't part of a some graft / kickback scheme to someone in gov't? Being worried about the contractor's team, I mentioned all this to the contractor and he said, "good you passed, it's a pain if we have to do remediation." I said, but I don't want your guys to get sick. Again, "don't worry about, we'll wear masks." Which they half did, half didn't.

This is and example of a perfect partnership of corruption between the licensed private inspection companies and the gov't officials licensing them. I got cheated out of money and the workers it should have protected (and others in the building) didn't get protected.

I really don't know much about Lily Tomlin at all, but in my mind, she is a hero for having one of the best quotes ever:

"No matter how cynical you become, it's never enough to keep up." - Lily Tomlin

Edward said:

...Here in London they give the kids free bus passes...

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Based on your description, I assume you're referring to public transportation? I've never been bused to school so I don't know all of the specifics, but here in the U.S. (or at least in this part of southern California) most, if not all, of the school districts have their own fleets of buses. These buses drive a specific route every school day, picking up the students and delivering them to their respective schools in the morning, and delivering them back to their neighborhoods after school. I assume this is all paid for from a percentage of the local "school" taxes and parents don't pay extra for this service, but I don't really know.

Fading Fast said:

...The DOB required us to hire a NYC licensed asbestos inspection company for $900 (which I had to pay before he'd come - checked, they all worked this way for the exact same fee) - sounded high to me, but I figured it would be very comprehensive as we were demoing one bathroom, one kitchen and doing some other work throughout that would break into some walls (all of this was on the NYC architect approved plans I had to submit to the DOB before hiring the asbestos inspector - also not cheap).

On the day of the inspection, I met the inspector - nice enough guy - who came into the apartment, took three random one-inch deep wall samples that were not from the rooms being demo'ed. I mentioned this to him, he shrugged, put the samples in a bag, told me I'd get a report in a few weeks and left (was in and out in under 10 minutes)...

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Last year we had to replace a total of 200 linear feet of wood fence, one section that borders the south side of our property and two sections that separate our front and back yards. The old fence was rotted, termite damaged, and should probably have been replaced five years ago, but we were setting aside the money for such a project while propping the old fence up as best we could. A rainstorm with accompanying winds on January 31st damaged the fence further, so we were able to get our insurance company involved to help cover the cost. That, of course, meant we had to do everything "by the book" so I contacted a contractor, got estimates, and created the planning to replace the fence that would have to be approved by The City before work could begin. Largely due to incompetence on the part of the city employees I dealt with, what should have been a relatively simple project was dragged out for seven months.

During this project three inspections became necessary--one planned inspection during the replacement to verify the contractor was performing the work in accordance with city codes, one unplanned inspection to resolve a minor issue involving an easement that encroached our property, and the final inspection once the fence was complete. The city sent out the same person for all three inspections, and it was obvious from the start that he had only a vague knowledge of the city codes and requirements at most. Nice guy, but we spent about 90% of the time during all three inspections chatting about things that had nothing to do with the construction. Mind you, I'd rather have someone like that than some hard-nosed schmoe who would look for any excuse to create problems that would delay the project further. But it seemed a waste of our time, energies , and money, to make sure everything was done properly, only to have a clearly disinterested inspector barely glance at the fence before signing the necessary paperwork.