Seriously, who buys these things? I know I lead a sheltered life, but I don't think I've ever seen any Surface product in the wild.

And yet, leftists and democrats continue voting for regressive taxes. My city, which is in a major metro area and always votes pretty strongly 'D', also just recently passed a new local sales tax, with 79% voting 'for'. I'm one of the few conservatives, and I voted against this regressive tax.

"Smart men don't get married."

Or at least demonetized.

They probably lost them in the same place where they lost the Epstein client list, all of the Epstein video tapes, and the Diddy records.

I'm not a huge Linux user anymore (I run FreeBSD as my daily driver) though I do have a Linux box running Slackware and another one running Mint. I'd suggest trying Linux Mint, It's easy to install and provides a familiar interface for those coming from Windows.

... for me.

I only use Windows at work because it's what they use. I just received a new computer Monday with Windows 11 because my old one couldn't be upgraded (ironically, I received the old one when they upgraded from 7 to 10 for the same reason.) This time it's taken me all week to get it configured into a somewhat usable state. I can't stand the tall task bar. It's strange that they want to remove "wasted" space in other areas where it's actually useful (like title bars that clearly delineate where to grab to move the window), while at the same time growing the taskbar to take nearly twice as much screen real estate as it did in 10, despite it working fine there.

I've already told the company that when they roll out windows 12 that will be my sign to retire. I'm not going through this again.

As someone who was just forced to received a new computer with Windows 11 at my day job, I can wholeheartedly agree. I've already made the decision I won't go through this again. When Windows 12 comes out, I'm going to retire.

The globalists elite, too. They don't want the commoners flying, just the elites.

As if there weren't already enough reasons to not by HP.

The bit I posted above was from a comic that appeared in Rainbow magazine some time in the early 1980s. I suspect it was a sendup of the WOPR bit.

Does this mean a phone will be required in order to board? I'm old enough to remember when airlines didn't want passengers to operate electronics at all on an aircraft, and now it's required. What a world!

Computer: "Do. You. Want. To. Play. A. Game?"
User: "How about 'Pong'?"
Computer: "Okay. But I guess I had in mind something more like 'Total Global Thermonuclear War.'"

Would you keep your voice down? Maybe they haven't thought of that yet!

Citigroup has been the idiot-child of the banking world, period. Back in college I was in a work program (similar to a co-op), making good money as an engineering student, I thought it would be a good idea to start to build some credit. Citibank sent me a "pre-approved" application which I filled out... and was denied. They said I had to call back between certain hours. Working and going to school full time meant it was hard to make that call (this was the era were the only portable phones were expensive car phones and similar units.) When I finally got the time to call I was greeted with a message that the office was closed and that they only accepted calls between certain hours, which were different than what they had said in their letter. On the next attempt, when I finally got ahold of someone and was able to ask why I was declined for my "pre-approved" card, I was told I was a credit risk. I asked them "Really? I work as an engineering student at a Fortune 50 company making twice what other people my age were making at fast-food joints." Their only response was "well, not everyone works at your company." What?

I filled out an application with a different credit card company who took a very different approach and quickly approved me. And to this day, I have avoided dealing with any of the Citigroup companies as much as possible. Looking at all of the scandals and problems they've had over the years, I'm glad to not deal with them.

Don't forget, Citigroup took a $25B bailout from the federal government in October of 2008, then also received $20B in additional emergency funding in November of 2008, plus an additional $5B set aside to backstop potential losses also in November of 2008, plus a $300B loan-loss backstop to insure against losses from the bank's mortgage-backed security investments, also in November of 2008.