Well yes, there is one in Berkeley. I used to work on it at LBL (Lawrence Berkeley Laboratory, now LB National Lab). It was in one of the cyclotron buildings, but we kept it confidential cause they didn't want to disrupt the economy too much. It would only work about 10-15 miles, as I recall, but they'd never tried to send any 'live' objects on it.

But the computer problems may have been solved by now, so who knows?

Yes, I have seen that as well. Perhaps there is some element in those old threads that is being reloaded? That might "fool" the system into loading it in the New queue.
Unfortunately, I know zilch about programming languages, so I don't know if that is a feasible possibility.

but i have noticed that when i click on a thread, the formatting of the page is all weird (ie it's in times new roman and the calendar isn't formatted nicely).. when i refresh the page it goes back to normal, but the new posts aren't marked "new" anymroe... anyone else have that problemo?

I'm just happy to have a job! These are scary times, jobs-wise.

ok, i asked a friend who is into all this stuff, and he pointed me to this settlement offer.

basically, the main complaint is with not being able to make median wages no matter how long you've been there. if you check page 18, you'll see that after working full time for almost 4 years, you hit the top of the pay scale and can't advance further. while the maximum amounts would be a halfway decent wage for someone just out of high school, it'd be difficult to raise a family on that. and, socal has a higher cost of living than many places in the US (gas prices are hovering around $1.69/gal for regular stuff and that's way down from the summer) the reason the vons (safeway) workers are on strike are because they don't want to pay the $5-$15/week for health care. albertsons and ralphs locked out their union employees so that vons wouldn't be singled out.

the holiday and vacation allotments are another thing that are pretty bad.

from page 16 of that agreement: after working for 6 mos, they get 2 holidays their first year (christmas and thanksgiving). then after having been there a year, 4th of july is thrown in the mix. after another 6 mos they get labor day. Then, 6 mos later (after being employed for 2 years), new years day. finally, after 3 1/2 years, they get memorial day. so basically when you start, you get no paid holidays. after a year they'll have 3 holidays. after 2 years they'll have 5 paid holidays. then after 3.5 years, they'll have a whopping 6. (to compare, my company gives everybody 12 paid holidays a year.)

vacation is similar. after year 1 you get 1 week. by year 3 you've finally graduated to 2 weeks, and after 7 years of service you can get 3 weeks of vacation. (my company gives new hires 2 weeks to start with)

oh, and the new hire health care wouldn't start until the 13th month of employment, and not until the *37th* month for dependants.

and of course, the executives get much much more.

ok, enough of that...

but yeah, i think we should go on strike too...we've gotta pay extra for healthcare too! UC GSI's are supposed to go on strike tomorrow.

and it looks like a pretty fair deal to me. $20/month in healthcare for a single or $40/month for a family is pretty good.

Grocery stores are a VERY low margin business. I think it is like 3-5% of the total purchase. If the current wage rates and health benefits keep increasing so will our grocery bills. This is one of the reason why places are trying the self checkout option. Worker costs keep increasing and profit margins keep decreasing. Remember this strike isn't helping anybody. Grocery stores are know under attack by WalMart, KMart, Costco and other "super"stores. They no longer have the economies of scale to keep them a better deal. Therefore they have to adjust. If they don't at some point they will disappear and those jobs will be completely lost.

If the unions can't get more out of their workers then I don't think that they have a leg to stand on. There is to much competition for them to argue. Look at what happened to the autoindustry and airline industry. Outside competitors come in without the handicaps that the existing stores have and they can beat you up pretty good. So the union is going to need to find something to give on here too.

BTW I like Vons I used to shop there all the time when I was in San Diego.

Now I shop at Mollie Stones up in the Bay Area. I pay more but the quality of goods and service make up for it. I didn't find that at Albertsons or Safeway, or Cala.

yeah, that's not that much to pay for health care...i think ours can be increased much more than that...a couple hundred a month or something... but i guess it's the principle of the matter that they're against. if they instate this now, they can easily increase it, or something. i dunno...it's a difficult battle from either side of the argument. for what little they're being paid, the extra costs can be difficult, especially for those who live paycheck to paycheck... but then the grocery stores are in a difficult position as well. but remember, the picketers at albertsons (and earlier at ralphs) are locked out, not on strike...

so i'm not completely sold either way, i just choose not to cross the lines.

oh, and i love andronicos and berkeley bowl in berkeley.

But she still can't teach her dad to spell words like "testament" correctly.


...Hey! I'm just sayin'!

In other news, it's not always in everyone's best interest to have your friend come over after 11:00 and stay for a couple hours when you have work the next day.

Nouns?

-Jn-
Efreeti Sophist

Well no Matt, I can't spell, but I thought you knew that.
And Joe, how many people, in your immediate acquaintance, have ever used the word 'cartography' or even know it's meaning? I was just bragging about my little girl (something I never do, right? *g*)

Strictly speaking, I used to be a cartographer- I worked for a surveyor, drawing maps. There are a lot of maps in the Syracuse area with my name on them, and even more that I drew that don't.

So there.

In Madrid (and other parts of Europe, I'd imagine), during Easter, almost everything, including grocery stores, is closed for 4 days. If you don't know in advance, that could pose a serious problem... Of course, those of us in Southern California who are choosing not to cross the picket lines have had to do without shopping at the major grocery chains for quite a while anyway...

the strike? I'm just interested in knowing why you are supporting it.

I'm actually a little undecided, since most of the "facts" out there are wrong (they conflict with each other), but since there are other alternatives (costco, trader joes, stater bros), I just go there instead. oh, and ralph's doesn't have picketers anymore either. I'd just rather avoid the picketers, although I did cross the picket lines once in early November, but they were complacent then, and didn't even bother talking to us. i've heard anything from they make an avg of $25/hr to they barely make a living wage...I'm not sure what to believe, and it does suck to have to pay more for healthcare...I've gotta do it too. so, basically, i'm being non-confrontational. anyone know the real facts?

You know, as a child I was taught never, NEVER to cross a picket line. I was taught this lesson very young, and for quite a while I actually thought you would be in physical danger if you crossed that line, that the people were out there to warn unwary shoppers and protect them from whatever scary thing was in that store. To this day, when I see a picket line in front of a grocery store I get an image of rampaging ghoulies in the ice cream aisle.

And those, yoda, are the Real Facts. At least about my life, they are.

Did have to deal with the same thing in St. Louis a few months ago (one of the places these strikes started), fortunately I think they got things worked out the other month. Did cross a picket "line", but they weren't really doing much, just standing in groups near the entrances to the parking lots holding signs. I'm sure Walmart and a number of the other stores saw a definite increase in business from it.

I think in St. Louis, though, they were trying to hire scabs for like $11/hr, so I'm pretty sure they don't make $25/hr average in the Midwest, anyway.

-There's someone in my head, but it's not me.-

Actually she came here on Sunday night and made Thanksgiving dinner. She had to go on her trip the next day.

There's some things your kids just have to learn for themselves. Like not coming home at 1 AM into SFO and relying on public transportation to get home. Of course she could have taken a cab (for about 50 bucks). Ah well, live and learn.

And I think she took BART to the airport (Under the Bay).

Or maybe she expected to be back before BART shut down for the night. There were lots of us at SFO Sunday night who were supposed to have arrived in time to take BART, before the weather delayed our flights for several hours.

Seems SFO was the only major airport in the country that had significant weather problems Sunday.

notice that ParU didn't say that she could have called him to pick her up!

Had she called, I would've gone. But she's more than capable of getting around by herself. And she didn't call...

There's no way in hell I'd call my parents at 1:00 in the morning, no matter how local they were. I'd call all five of my friends first.

But hey, maybe I value my autonomy more than most.