So trivial, yet it really ticks you off.

[Fading Fast]

Track takeout is far too high; also the fees for availing the exotics.
The Delaware Handicap is synonymous in memory of racecourse larceny; a generous trifecta-a hunch mathematically
nailed down while screwing off on the internet at the office-and although I enjoyed sliding the grand plus inside
my wallet the track's cut sliced the wad considerably. I prefer the exotics to a single winner play. Last Kentucky Derby
I thought to TED-spread Maximum Security and Country House in a series of tri/superfecta bets but abandoned
the notion at the last minute-taking Maximum Security as lead horse in a promising superfecta, with a Super 5/all.
Busted flush with the disqualification though I blame myself for not going the TED with Country House.
Still, I love the game, find profit, and accept that the piper gets paid at the window.

I've narrowed myself to win or exacta betting, always avoid favorites (always overpriced, IMO, kinda like a bull-market stock) and use jockey, trainer, past performance and another fundamentals with assessment of odds as the technicals. That said, it is still just entertainment to me with a good day being a break even including costs - tickets, travel, food - and an okay day being some winners resulting in it costing less than a broadway show to be entertained for many more hours.

Kudos to you if you consistently find profit as - as we both noted - the house takes an egregious cut. While I think the financial markets are much more than just a race track with meaningfully smaller vig/spread, if one does want to think about the financial markets as a casino - it is the most cost-efficient-to-the-better casino (assuming you avoid the products with excessive transparent and hidden fees) ever invented.

 

[Harp]

if one does want to think about the financial markets as a casino - it is the most cost-efficient-to-the-better casino (assuming you avoid the products with excessive transparent and hidden fees) ever invented.

I read Richard J Teweles' The Commodity Futures Game; Who Wins, Loses, Why? in college and during law school
worked the overnight trading desk at LindWaldock which taught a telephone grad seminar in trader psychology.
Teweles is a marvelous read and a Bernard Baruch quote from the book has always stayed in mind: "All of life is a speculation." I've never thought of either markets or track as anything other than arenas of intellectual contest,
and, admittedly my mistakes have both cost and profited (by later rigorous analysis); though the thought process
is always enjoyable and of equal satisfaction with profit.

 

[GHT]

Barcodes undoubtedly expedite the checkout process. And in concert with other technologies of fairly recent vintage, they make for greater efficiencies in inventory control and loss prevention.

Throw in “loyalty” cards and you can kiss privacy goodbye.

My life has been that of logistics. The simple task of getting goods from A to B. You might be a client, you dispatched an important consignment to your customer last Tuesday, they still haven't got it. You phone me up and a customer services clerk answers the phone. She/he introduces themselves, the company and, if the company is multi location, the depot where they are. You explain your delivery problem. You're asked if you have the consignment number for your query. A quick enquiry, an even quicker search and somebody comes up with ABC123. You are told that someone will get back to you shortly.

The person taking the enquiry knows that the goods were delivered by another depot. They phone that depot, quote the consignment ABC123 and ask for a proof of delivery. The person at the delivery depot then goes through the reams of paper files until they find ABC123, it was signed for by John Smith the day after it was dispatched. The delivery depot faxes the collecting depot a copy of the proof of delivery.

The clerk that took the original call returns the call to the client and tells them that the proof of delivery is coming through on the fax. When the client sees the name they contact their customer, that customer admits that John Smith works in the goods receiving area. After following up the paper chase it's discovered that John Smith never processed the incoming goods so it was assumed that the carrier was at fault.

Are you still with me? Nowadays, the goods are scanned at the point of collection, scanned at the incoming depot, scanned at the sortation centre, scanned by the delivery depot and scanned at the point of delivery where the receiver signs the driver's scanner. When the customer requires a proof of delivery all that's required is to go on line, request proof of delivery, quote consignment ABC123 and John Smith's name will pop up. No corridors of filing cabinets, no faxes, no multiple phone calls and no accusations that the carrier must be to blame.

 

[tonyb]

^^^^
Long, long ago, when I was a taxicab dispatcher, I foresaw a day when digital technologies would render that occupation obsolete, and that the world of ground transportation would be much the better for it.

The so-called “ride share” outfits — Uber and Lyft — have pretty well done in the “legacy” taxicab industry in many American cities. The complacency born of what was essentially a taxicab monopoly left the door wide open for those new players. But the larger factor was the smartphone, without which Uber and Lyft just wouldn’t work. The taxicab companies in most major cities now have smartphone apps of their own, but they are so late to the game that I wouldn’t bet on them ever catching up.

I occasionally helped a friend from those days after he set up a logistics biz of his own — “next flight out” shipments were his bread and butter. Suffice to say that the BS excuses people attempted then just wouldn’t work today.

 

[ChiTownScion]

"So trivial yet it really ticks me off." Well, since it's December, here goes.

Broadcast announcements on Christmas Eve of NORAD tracking Santa. "Really lame," as my one son would intone during his early teen years.

 

[Trenchfriend]

Not nice, but not really ticking me off.

Analog cable-TV is actually finally shutting down, in old Germany.

But UKW (FM) cable-radio and VHS-cassettes are still much more important to me.

 

[Edward]

"So trivial yet it really ticks me off." Well, since it's December, here goes.

Broadcast announcements on Christmas Eve of NORAD tracking Santa. "Really lame," as my one son would intone during his early teen years.

They do that in the UK too, at least on the local news in NI. I always find it kinda cute, really.... though I wodner about the whoel Santa thing in general, though. In recent years, schools in the UK have been encouraged to avoid talking about presents after Christmas, and beforehand to avoid the traditional lines about naughty and nice because there are now so many kids in poverty who, no matter how well behaved they are, will get little or nothing. The stories I've heard from teaching friends and relatives would make you cry. It's an unfair world.

 

[LizzieMaine]

I've always though the whole "naughty or nice" angle is completely antithetical to the so-called "Spirit of Christmas." I was under the impression that the whole theological basis for the holiday supposedly revolves around a gift that is in every way completely undeserved by the recipients. But I only went to Sunday School for six years, so what do I know?

 

[ChiTownScion]

I've always though the whole "naughty or nice" angle is completely antithetical to the so-called "Spirit of Christmas." I was under the impression that the whole theological basis for the holiday supposedly revolves around a gift that is in every way completely undeserved by the recipients. But I only went to Sunday School for six years, so what do I know?

Unconditional election? A bit Calvinistic for a nice Methodist girl, some might say. But it does raise the issue succinctly.

The whole Santa as Behavior Control (at least in December) topic could be a goldmine for therapists decades after the fact.

 

[Edward]

Ah, no - we Methodists are big on the 'all have sinned and fallen short, but that's cool because Jesus is forgiving like that' end of things. Presbyterians... .oh, my. They're another lot.

Elf on the Shelf I have known to be both hated and loved by parents in equal measure. Personally, I much prefer Krampus in the Corner. It's probably a good thing I don't have kids!

 

[LizzieMaine]

Elf on the Shelf fills me with rage. At least Santa had some basis in folklore before the Boys stuck a Coke in his hand and a Lucky Strike in his mouth and turned him into a plastic lawn ornament. The Elf was made up by the Boys out of whole cloth. Sickening.

It's the New England Congregationalists who go in big for the whole "Jesus hates you because have impure thoughts about Douglas Fairbanks" thing. I was always scared of them as a kid because they had that big church on the hill where they could look down upon all of us and sit in judgement. I think Congregationalist kids go to sleep on Christmas Eve hoping Calvin Coolidge will slide down the chimney and leave them a box of horehound cough drops.

 

[3fingers]

I've never understood the appeal of the elf on a shelf thing. My kids had no interest in it, so I guess I should be grateful for having been spared having to learn what it is.

 

[GHT]

The whole Santa as Behavior Control (at least in December) topic could be a goldmine for therapists decades after the fact.

The three stages of Santa. 1) You belive in Santa. 2) You don't believe in Santa. 3) You are Santa.

 

[GHT]

It's the New England Congregationalists who go in big for the whole "Jesus hates you because have impure thoughts about Douglas Fairbanks" thing. I was always scared of them as a kid because they had that big church on the hill where they could look down upon all of us and sit in judgement. I think Congregationalist kids go to sleep on Christmas Eve hoping Calvin Coolidge will slide down the chimney and leave them a box of horehound cough drops.

At the catholic school that I went to, we were taught that God is love................................we were taught it with a big, thick, lead lined, heavy leather strap, so it must be true.

 

[LizzieMaine]

When I was little, I visualized God as looking exactly like Eric Severeid. I never quite got over that.

 

[3fingers]

When I was little, I visualized God as looking exactly like Eric Severeid. I never quite got over that.

Interesting. I'm not sure that Murrow would agree with one of the apostles sitting on the throne though.

 

[ChiTownScion]

Ah, no - we Methodists are big on the 'all have sinned and fallen short, but that's cool because Jesus is forgiving like that' end of things. Presbyterians... .oh, my. They're another lot.

A Presbyterian is simply a Methodist* with a bank account. Whereas, an Episcopalian** is a Presbyterian who is smart enough to live off his investments.

* A Methodist being, of course, a Baptist who can read.

** Some versions say that an Episcopalian is a Catholic who flunked high school Latin.

 

[ChiTownScion]

It's the New England Congregationalists who go in big for the whole "Jesus hates you because have impure thoughts about Douglas Fairbanks" thing. I was always scared of them as a kid because they had that big church on the hill where they could look down upon all of us and sit in judgement. I think Congregationalist kids go to sleep on Christmas Eve hoping Calvin Coolidge will slide down the chimney and leave them a box of horehound cough drops.

Last church I ever held membership in was a Presbyterian (PCUSA) church. Fairly mainstream and moderate denomination nowadays- although some smaller Presbyterian sects are more into the Calvin/ Knox hell fire and damnation. Presbyterianism was the battleground in the 1920's between liberal and Fundamentalist theologians: Princeton Theological Seminary was the prize, and the Fundamentalists lost. The Scopes Trial is what most think of when the conflict is mentioned, but it was originally rooted in an academic showdown.

The core difference between Presbyterian and Congregationalist churches was, traditionally, church government: think "elected representative government" vs. "traditional New England town meeting."

My understanding is that the largest group of Congregationalists became the United Church of Christ a few decades ago.

 

[Hercule]

When I was little, I visualized God as looking exactly like Eric Severeid. I never quite got over that.

Though largely an atheist, I thank you for that. It's a much needed and sincerely appreciated replacement for George Burns and Morgan Freeman.

 

[Harp]

At the catholic school that I went to, we were taught that God is love................................we were taught it with a big, thick, lead lined, heavy leather strap, so it must be true.

The Christian Brothers of Ireland employed the same approach, veritas, veritas.