Two Fiddy [ AN P PG ]

Two fiddy - two dollars and fifty cents (not "tree fiddy") is about the taxes owed. Owed where? Well, we used to live in Danielson CT, and when we received our DMV registration renewal, it says we owe back taxes. When I called to check, I was told it was $13.84; which means using the CT municipality property tax rate of 18%, we allegedly "owed" tax of about $2.50 from 1997.

I did try and ask the Danielson tax drone what happened, and why - as we have renewed DMV registrations many, many times - why did this not crop up before? The answer - repeated twice - was a cryptic "you do not have to receive a bill to be responsible for your taxes." In CT one does not have to receive a tax bill to be responsible, and the burden of proof is on you. There is also the 15-year statute of limitations for CT personal property tax!

The NY Times wrote about this a few years ago, and apparently it happens a lot. I suppose in this case it is just cheap enough to pay it. I am sure glad Richard Blumenthal CT Attorney General is "concerned", as he did such a great job controlling the SoBe company's false health claims for their beverages, as if that f-ing matters!

So today I cannot buy the Sobe brand "elixer" drinks in Connecticut (but I suppose like many I'll just buy it in Massachusetts like I do my gas, and my liquor in New Hampshire); and I have to pay un undocumentable $13.47 to a town I lived in last millennium!

So who's running Libertarian this year?

Photo Phun [ H I PI RR R S T ]

This blog itself does not actually have these warnings and ratings applicable to it per se; but the new set of photos on Flickr does. I have had the idea come to me of taking photos, and edit/caption them on my iPhone, with results ranging from a chuckle to sheer outrage (but still funny).

For those interested, I use the following programs:  "Comic Touch" (for the captions); "Picoli" (basic touch-up, such as brightness) and "Magic Touch" (more advanced photo editing like selective blurring). They are not PhotoShop by any means, but amazing nonetheless.

Note that some of these programs have overlapping features as they have been developed beyond v 1.0, but I suffer from the disease appiphilia.

Electric Car Success? [ G T ]

I've said it many times, and I'll say it again. the sine qua non for an electric car to succeed will be if the battery modules are standardized and easily removable; in fact designed to be removable. That way, if you are low you pull into a "filling station" an attendant pops one out and pops in a fully-charged one.

The one you dropped off is put into a charging rack (along with dozens of others) so it can be reused when recharged in an hour or so. Large warehouses (this is run by the oil companies after all, so they could use their existing gas station and distribution center infrastructure) would carry extra packs so if a "filling station" was getting low on fully-charged packs, they could call up and order more.

The number of battery modules a vehicle carries is dependent on size/cargo space: a small 2-person commuter car has 2 packs, while the larger truck or family van uses 8-10.

This way "recharges;' are as quick or quicker than filling a gas tank, the batteries are easily removed at end of life without disassembling the car, and smaller pack give some design creativity (i.e. not one ginormous pack amidships) and the weight can be distributed for better handling.