These meters aren't really about the homeless, they're about panhandlers. The point isn't to raise money. Often they collect very little money and take a while to even cover the costs of the meter and installation.

The point is to give the suckers who are targeted by professional panhandlers an out. You don't feel guilty telling a panhandler no when you've made a donation at the meter... or more likely, plan to give a donation but never get around to it. While it surely varies from place to place, in my city when the police do sweeps on aggressive panhandlers, they find that the vast majority (over 80%) have homes and most have jobs... they're just supplementing their income because it's easy and has almost no downside.

Aggressive panhandlers are destroyers of business and entertainment districts. Most of the homeless do not panhandle! While there is some overlap between the two groups, it is not as much as one would think. Governments and social agencies have tried lots of methods of breaking the panhandler-guilt-visitor money flow. The meters are just the latest attempt. They might end up working but let's not fool ourselves into seeing them as any kind of cure for homelessness. While they do provide some money for programs aimed at the homeless, it is a very tiny drop in the bucket and the meters are really about changing the quality of experience people have while visiting the district in question.

If this works to get rid of the aggressive panhandlers, it should also help the homeless by allowing people to feel sympathy for them again. There is nothing like being followed around and cursed at by someone wanting your money to harden your heart. Panhandlers masking themselves as homeless doing tremendous damage to the image of the truly homeless and make it difficult to raise funds for programs that can make a difference.

Take that Snoreway!

What ever happened to the good ol' method of using cattle prods? We're becoming a bunch of weak pansies, I tell ya! When my grandma comes to the hospital to see her new great-grandson, she doesn't want to be guided by a namby-pamby glittery disco floor. A good swift kick in the bum here and there to get her on the right course is what she wants and what we all should want. Stop weakening our country!!! (whatever country that might be)

What evolutionary trade off was made the required us to need to wipe our bottoms? Is this common among primates? Do chimps wipe their bums on trees, rocks or the ground to get them clean? Seems kind of odd that we have this need in the first place.

Regardless of why we need it, I took the plunge and bought a washlet. It's pretty nice though I still use a square or two of toilet paper to dry since the dryer built into the seat only gets you about 80% of the way. Maybe if they caught on more in the US the price would drop.

Coming this fall to TLC: "Language Hoarders"

Each week we visit a tenure track professor at a middle tier state university to help them stop obsessively hoarding every shred of dying languages and cultures. At first they're open and receptive to the concerns of their liberal arts colleagues but when someone throws away a USB stick containing the only known recording of an Amazonian language last spoken six decades ago, the elbow patches go flying!

I have a wood turtle who use to climb up the screen door to the patio by wedging herself between the screen and the glass door. Apparently she had some cat DNA in her.

Human sacrifice, dogs and cats living together... mass hysteria!

Makes me wonder how often this kind of thing happens out in the wild without anyone noticing.

It's really about lifestyle. If you're the type of person who is almost never home, because of career and socializing, paying for a ton of space doesn't make sense. For a young professional in New York, long days at the office combined with a city that offers unlimited opportunities for interesting activities, the living space just needs to be a place to sleep, wash up and store clothing. If you want sex, you'll find a way to make it happen or pick a partner who has a bit more space than you do.

OTOH, if you live in a boring city or aren't a people person, then yeah, you need to be somewhere that will give you more personal space to do your own thing for a relatively low price. For me, I like to be somewhere between the two extremes.

Kind of cool but the commenters here make some good points about it not being practical, at least not as currently implemented. When it it is hidden, there could be a plate matching the flooring that covers it. When it is time for it to rise, the plate would slide out of the way. If it is kept in a basement space, there might not be much usable space lost when hidden.

But let's face it... it's mostly tech for the sake of being tech. Nothing wrong with that as long as it's a hobby and not being touted as a great innovation in kitchen design.

Oh no... Jay Leno might make fun of us!

Seriously, how thin skinned does a town have to be to worry about one or two cracks from late night comedians?

Of course I don't feel that sorry for the voters in the poll either. I suspect that many were voting for reasons other than Mayor Baals long term of service.

Is there a robotic gurney to move you from the bed into the tube? It might make for a very effective alarm clock on those mornings when you just can't get up.

I really enjoyed the underground tour while in Seattle two years ago since I knew absolutely nothing about the history of the city. But it isn't for everyone and I can imagine that if you don't get a good guide that it could be boring. There was a couple behind me on the tour complaining that it wasn't as good as Underground Atlanta. I guess they were expecting Johnny Rockets and a 'As Seen on TV' store.

Ok, I'm probably weird but after the Northridge quake (which I'm guessing is the one they're talking about), I got so use to the aftershocks that I had a hard time falling asleep if there weren't any. A couple small ones put me at peace.

Love the NBC version of the @ sign. Wonder if their video production equipment at the time was even able to generate one.

It's an easy way to indulge those old "what if" thoughts. Though I'm in touch with several ex-girlfriends on Facebook, it's the now married women who long ago I only dated briefly or was only friends with that put out the feelers looking for something outside their relationship. I guess for those who feel like their marriage is stuck in a rut, Facebook's connections to the past are just too much of a temptation to resist.