Guest Contributor – Ed Brault – 09JAN2023 – On Settling Old Scores

(This was in response for demanding reparations for the cultural appropriation of my ancestors superior concrete recipe – photog)

As a descendant of Slavs, I demand a reparation from your reparations! My ancestors were seized and transported to Rome as slave labor and forced to mix their superior concrete. (I wonder if the formula also included human blood.) I will take my payment in gold aureae, 1000 per captured ancestor and descendants to the Fall of the Empire. If coin is not available, I will accept (unrolls scroll) bullion, jewelry, a reserved parking space, my own Winnebago, a chance to direct, (OOPS, wrong scroll), vineyards, pastureland, and 5000 sheep, and a Rudis, the wooden Sword of Freedom.

 

 

Guest Contributor – Ed Brault – 24OCT2022 – Northern Tier Winter

“And the first time one of those cute little electric cars gets stuck in a snow storm and runs out of charge on the road”

I lived on the Northern Tier (North Dakota, Champlain Valley of NY/Vermont) for over 30 years. double-digit below-zero winters were the norm. I know some very long, lonely stretches of highway where an EV would be at a serious disadvantage. I would really like to see an honest evaluation of range and battery performance at minus-20F. Just how much of that “300-mile” range will you get at night, with the headlights, heater, wipers, and other accessories, as well as propulsion drawing power. Add in an 80-mile stretch of road that has NO cell, CB, VHF, or FM coverage. Would YOU want to be in an EV, alone, at night, in a snowstorm, with no way to call for help?