Google has obviously been toying with the idea of getting into the electricity business for a while. Here is a video of the late Dr Bussard (of Bussard Ramjet/Collector fame) giving a talk about his proposed "Polywell" reactor to a room of Google staff. Sadly the design didn't pan out but it's still a good watch as he talks about some of the non-technical barriers to fusion power research in the US.

Not just South America, Spain too. But no, siesta happens during the day and is more about resting while it's too hot to work. What I was referring to is people breaking up their nightly sleep into two parts.

I myself wondered if it explained why older people often get up during the night. It's not necessarily that they need to pee; they've just reverted to a more natural sleeping pattern.

The eight hours thing is comparatively recent anyway. In centuries past it was the norm to go to bed much earlier than we do now, wake up around midnight for a couple of hours then go back to sleep until the sun came up. This "bi-phasic" sleep pattern became less common during the industrial age, when workers needed to get as much sleep as possible in a shorter time to free up more time for work.

Exactly. Except now it's been co-opted by straight people who just want to sound like they're special. If you were Jewish, for example, how would you feel about someone wearing a yarmulke as a fashion accessory?

I'm only saying it because it applies to the situation; I don't go around telling random people in the street, partly because I know that it could end very badly for me.

They're not "allies". Our struggle for equality and acceptance was largely won before the blue hair brigade was even born.

People in hair shirts don't get sympathy. They get contempt from me for their affectation. They're somewhat similar to goths in this respect, except with the goths the culture that they were aping never really existed in the first place. You want to play dress up? Fine, just don't insult people's very identities by pretending to be one of them.

Not in my experience. If they were really gay then they'd have no problem identifying as such. Some of them may say they're "a bit bisexual" but I'd bet my bottom dollar that they have never nor ever will be with someone of the same sex excepting one or two instances of alcohol-induced fumbling. I have to agree with what you say about bisexuals - they often do get a hard time from gay people - so I can only imagine what a real bisexual thinks about someone who merely calls themselves one to sound like a cool, edgy nonconformist.

Well, not me, obviously.

"The majority is always sane."

I'm still waiting for someone who calls themselves "queer" to explain - to this actual homosexual - what it means besides "look at meeee!".

Those bloody adverts for Liven don't help.

"You don't procrastinate you have cortisol addiction."
"People with ADHD do this too".
A load of old bollocks, all of it skirting the rules on advertising healthcare services. Not that Google ever does anything about adverts that violate their policies.

Quick, someone tell them that Jesus was brown.

*cries in Safari*

War for the Overworld was pretty decent I thought. Chunders aren't Bile Demons and Succubi are obviously no substitute for Black Mistresses but you have to take what you can get. It doesn't have the darkness of the original but neither did DK2.

I was talking about things like barrel jacks, switches and other things that have to stand up to human fingers, not components in general. Perhaps "structural" was a poor choice of word. I wasn't suggesting that everything on the board be glued down, but if you have something like a power socket or I/O connector that's regularly plugged and unplugged and it's only held down by solder it will most likely be the first that fails on the board.

It doesn't matter how big the joint is, you never use solder for structural reasons, especially for connectors. Solder is exceptionally poor when it comes to metal fatigue; hell, sometimes joints fail just from thermal cycling.

It is, but I think the idea is that hot takeaway food counts as a luxury more than cold does. Similarly, while chocolate covered biscuits are classed as luxuries, cakes are not. This like to the company the makes Jaffa Cakes arguing with what was then HM Customs & Excise that since Jaffa Cakes go hard when they are stale rather than soft as biscuits do they should be subject to the reduced rate of VAT. There are lots of odd rules with VAT, but it doesn't matter because the price on the shelf is what you pay.

I think VAT applies equally to everything you get from McDonalds, though the rate used to be different if you ate inside or not. One other oddity is that if you go to Subway for a sandwich it's VAT exempt but if it's toasted then it should attract VAT. What happens with an untoasted meatball marinara is an exercise left to the reader.