Some things are still there but others are long gone and hard to picture. There are a few nice plots of grass where eyesores that were once homes and businesses stood for decades. It’s a miracle that no one fell into the basement of that one old apartment before it was removed from the earth. The building next to it that used to have a check-cashing place is undergoing a tedious transformation with a few bricks being removed daily

Long ago it was Dairy Mart then it became Mister Vs. Verdell has long since passed on along with the ability…

Can you get paid to keep your new year’s resolutions? Surprisingly, the answer is yes. Last year around this time I wrote about apps that will people to improve their lives.

If your new year’s resolution involves being healthier. There are a few companies out there that will reward you for maintaining healthy habits. Last year I got $30 from Achievement. All I had to do was link the Achievement app to other apps that are used primarily for keeping track of healthy habits like hiking, meditating, and keeping a food diary. Each activity is worth about 6 points. I…

What is The Problem with Religion?

It’s a complicated question because there are a lot of religions and they are all different. Some people talk about religion as if it’s synonymous Catholicism. Catholics don’t even represent all Christians let alone all religions. The other group that gets brought up a lot in Evangelicals. Nobody knows what an evangelical is, but they are quick to accuse them of being anti-science and pro-Trump. There are other people that just think religion means Abrahamic religions and still others think religion is just whatever religions they have heard of. The truth is there are…

There has been a lot of controversy over the years about how certain ethnic groups should be labeled. Africans, Ethiopians, Negros, Coloreds, Blacks, African Americans. Different terms used to describe the same group of people. There are of course other labels that are universally considered insulting and unacceptable. No one wants to be called a nigger, a coon, or a porch monkey. Yet there are many words that are just as damaging to our community that everybody just accepts.

The easiest way to give a word a negative connotation is to associate it with low income black people, also known…

Will a Robot Take Your Job?

Examining how robots can be used to replace human workers. There are a lot of reasons why humans could be replaced by robots but it doesn’t seem to be happening in real life. People are constantly being replaced by machines but more jobs for people keep appearing. If machines ever get to the point where they are technically capable of doing everything people will still be hesitant to use them for everything because of potential damage to the economy.

People have been worried about losing their jobs to machines for a long time. John…

I probably should have told him I didn’t have a license before I agreed to pick up the rental car. Luckily the guy behind the counter was not a stickler for details. My heart was racing as I pulled out of the parking space but I didn’t have much room for error. The drive from Hertz was uneventful but when I tried to park by the dock there were no spaces so I had to go park by the community college. I ran over something but I don’t think anybody noticed.

Of course, I didn’t tell him I had a…

The night air was cooler than I expected but a cab pulled up quickly. Victoria and I didn’t have a clear sense of where we wanted to go so she asked the Driver.

“Have many people from our ship been in your cab tonight?”

“Yes, “ he replied.”but I have only fisherman in my cab tonight . You the first mermaids.”

Victoria twisted her face in confusion so I translated. “ So we are the first females you’ve had in your cab all night?”

“The guys from your ship they like go to hostess bars. …