Machinist

That's a different one, Boebert, giving handies at all-ages musicals. This one, Green, fucked her CrossFit trainer or something.

Also:

Perjury Trailer Queen > Marjory Taylor Green.

Automatic transmissions have been around since the 60's or 50's, IIRC.

US made things that are the best or in a small group of the best:

Hand tools, power tools, machine tools, alloys, plastics, clothing/footwear, hardware, firearms, whiskey, porn, movies/shows, glass/ceramics, camping/outdoor, and all sorts of luxury items.

Affordability is a different issue. There are usually options that are good enough and cheaper.

Not original to me. Totally stole it.

It will be fun if we lose modern high yield rapeseed and soybean. Lovely.

Unrelated but horrible farm story you reminded me of. Worked on a tater farm when I was a kid. One of my favorite things when riding the planter was when they would spray fungicide on the planting from previous days. It smelled just like Grapico cola (grape flavored soft drink). We all loved the smell of it and basically huffed the wind. Probably get dick cancer or something from it one day.

Novel inbound. Don't think I've ever written this down.

I hadn't heard of the big mountain lion from Florida, I'll have to look into it. Nifty.

I have heard that the lions in Florida experienced a bad genetic bottleneck and are inbred and won't survive long term without intervention. There has been discussion about bringing in fresh breeding stock to try and help them, don't know if its been instituted.

I saw mine deep in the woods, about 10mi north of a place called Cougar Holler. (I heard about that holler after this.) I saw the cat in Skyline WMA in North Alabama. Was 2mi from a road, no trail, after dark, coming up the side of a holler.

On a flat spot up the side, almost to the top, I saw what looked like green headlights coming towards me. It was confusing because you couldn't even get a four wheeler in there and it was quiet. Realized it was eyes as it got closer, we were moving towards each other. Got to about 20 yards and realized it was a giant cat. LED lamp, so color isn't great/lot of green, but it looked like gold/tan fur and white belly. Its tail was proportionally shorter than a house cat and longer than a bobcat. End of the tail was squarish, almost tufted. Face was blocky and a little flatter than a common housecat. It was twice, maybe three times the size of a bobcat, so probably a juvenile.

The way it moved was like a snake slithering. It was up on a deadfall, and it kept sliding out of my light. It slid off the log towards me. At that point I drew my handgun and started growling and hissing. It stopped and stared at me and I kept moving towards it. It turned back the way it came and just casually slithered away. It wasn't afraid of me, just no longer interested.

I know bobcats and house cats. This was not that.

I will never, ever, forget its eyes or the way it moved. The entire event is burned into my memory. Adrenaline was up, but I wasn't scared, living in the moment, excited. Got the shakes when I made it back to my truck and sat down.

One of the peak experiences of my life.

Yup. Unfortunately, once released, the magic smoke is gone and cannot be replaced.

All electrical components contain magic smoke that was put into them at the time of manufacture. If that smoke is released, it doesn't work anymore.

Some broken or malfunctioning machinery respond to incantations projected with emotion. Cuss a machine hard enough and it will start working again.

Another one I've personally experienced, but don't know of any studies for: the main casting of machining equipment such as mills or lathes is a big crystal with unique properties. Each machine has different frequencies it resonates at when cutting. You can hear and feel the vibration when cutting and tune the machine/program for more efficient cutting and tool life. Sort of like taking a guitar that is out of tune and tuning it to a pleasant chord. Two identical machines will need different tunings. This tuning can change over time due to wear, temperature, humidity or maybe the phase of the moon.

Unrelated to machinery: there are mountain lions in the deep south in the deep woods. I had one check me out once. The state wildlife agency denies the modern existence of mountain lions and I didn't believe in them until I was face to face with one. I had to growl and hiss at it to convince it that I wasn't interesting.

Fusarium

Doing some quick searching, I didn't find anything that covers your scenario. Not that I don't believe you, but do you have a source on Fusarium quickly evolving fungicide resistance in a big way?

Born and raised in fundamentalist evangelical Christianity. The vast majority of evangelicals will know the story of Moses and the golden calf.

A significant minority of evangelicals actually regularly study the Bible. (I used to be one of them.) They tend to be the core of the membership and teach classes and have leadership positions. See Mike Johnson for an example.

The level of internal propaganda is wild. To be able to maintain that faith while regularly studying the Bible takes a lot of willing suspension of disbelief. Basically, they live in a bubble where they self-censor incoming information.

Something like the ex-mormon CES Letter is needed for the evangelicals. Homeschooling also needs to have required curriculum to give children logical tools.

Conservative cultural christians are a different problem and probably what you're actually thinking of. They're useful idiots for the far right as well as the evangelicals. They really don't know much about the Bible or denominations around them and tend to believe what they were told last by far right media or their smart uncle who's into conspiracy theories and shit. Political and religious outrage as entertainment.

I have a pi 4 server that hangs up after a few days. Tried to track down what was causing it but didn't go to extremes. Most expedient solution was to force a reboot.

Have a cron job that reboots the pi at 3:00 AM each day. Easy work around, lazy was better.

I'm a redneck. Not inbred more than normal, as far as I know. I think I'm purty smart sometimes. Since you and I are 50th cousins, at worst, you've got some redneck in you.

Don't be like the fascists. Don't get lazy in your thinking. Our antagonists are human, some are very intelligent.

To defeat their ideology, we must view them accurately. Otherwise, how will we anticipate what they will do?