January 30 2016, 20:04

In my Toyota, there are ready “one-click” replies to messages. An interesting set (translation mine):

– driving, will call back later

– will be late

– will be there soon

– thanks

– can’t wait to see you sooner

– yes

– no

– what to bring?

– where are you?

– you are the best!!!!

– LOL

It seems, indeed, to be the standard set for all occasions in life

January 30 2016, 09:54

Following the post about transparency and trust in the USA.

In the housing contract, there is a final clause that obligates the lessor to inform tenants with children about the existence of a public registry of undesirable individuals – http://sex-offender.vsp.virginia.gov/ You enter your address or zip code and receive a list of these individuals with photos, exact addresses where they live and work, and what they were convicted for.

January 29 2016, 22:53

After 0.33 of a beer, you can take the wheel here.

Found something interesting online on the topic of “how it works”:

“One drink (12 oz beer, 1.25 oz 80 proof, or 4 oz wine) will raise your BAC approx 0.02. The human body will metabolize approx 0.015 per hour. These numbers are approximate, as everyone metabolizes alcohol at slightly different rates.

With regards to eating you need to understand how alcohol enters the bloodstream. Alcohol is absorbed, not digested. Approx 80% of the alcohol is absorbed through the lining of the small intestine. Approx 10-15% is absorbed through the stomach lining, and approx 5-10% is expelled through breath. With that said, when you consume food, the pyloric valve at the base of the stomach closes, to keep the undigested food in your stomach until it is completely digested. If you consume alcohol while the pyloric valve is closed (on a full stomach or with undigested food in the stomach) the alcohol just sits in the stomach where only 10-15% is being absorbed. Once the food is digested and the pyloric valve opens, you get a rush of alcohol into your small intestine, where 80% of it is absorbed into your bloodstream. Food does not keep you from getting drunk, it causes you to get drunk later.

How long it takes all of the alcohol to metabolize out of your system depends on how much alcohol is in your system at the highest point or when you stop consuming alcohol. If you get up to a 0.15 at your highest, and don’t consume any alcohol once you get to that point, it will take approximately 10 hours for all of the alcohol to metabolize out of your system. This is why people who get themselves up to a very high level (0.25 or so) and stop drinking at last call (2am), are still WAY over the legal limit when they go to work at 9 am. If someone was at a 0.25 at 2am, they would only have metabolized approximately 0.11 worth of alcohol by the time they leave for work at 9am, thus leaving them somewhere around a 0.14, even though they might just feel “hungover”.

January 28 2016, 17:21

In America, a great deal in business and life is built on trust.

An interesting system, where bending the rules is very easy, but you are only given the right to do so once in a lifetime.

Once caught, you end up on the list of unreliable people, and you simply can’t approach the issue of trust a second time – for example, you won’t be hired for a decent job, the bank won’t give you a loan, the insurance company won’t offer fair terms, and you won’t be able to rent a decent apartment at a reasonable price, etc. You will need to live by the rules for a long while and slowly in order to rebuild trust, gradually bringing your karma back to a normal level. Or you could move to the right neighborhood with others like you πŸ™‚

I find it a very beautiful system. However, it requires a certain organization of information systems and processes, which the government needs to mature to support. In Russia, for example, even the civil registry database isn’t centralized, nor are the databases of the Ministry of Internal Affairs. Checking if someone has any misdemeanors turns into hundreds of requests across regions into different databases, then often requires manual aggregation of all this together. The process is so “expensive” in terms of resources and relatively slow that only insiders or quasi-insiders use it.

January 28 2016, 11:32

On document turnover in the USA. Look how interesting it is signing a contract with a real estate agency (just 10 minutes away by car) – photo. Yesterday, I sent them a signed check from the bank, photographed with my cellphone, which they forwarded to the realtors representing the apartment owner (the check for the application fee).

And yesterday, I physically signed a contract to purchase a car that is a meter long. I’ll make a separate post about it someday)