If we really want to get to the basics…

In chemistry, a salt or ionic compound is a chemical compound consisting of an assembly of positively charged ions and negatively charged ions, which results in a compound with no net electric charge

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Salt_(chemistry)

The personality of the actor always outweighs the role they play in movies for me. I love the original Mission Impossible as a kid, but that was destroyed when the story was appropriated by scientology.

No matter how “good” a character is in the movies, it’s ruined by knowing the person playing that character is a complete douche.

The problem for me is not what it seems though. I love good movies and part of that experience is complete and total immersion in the quality of the filming, acting, visual effects, sound and storyline. It’s almost a hypnotic state and it doesn’t take much for me to get distracted. A complete jackass of an actor is a distraction.

You mean WALL-E wasn’t real?

LPT: You can usually search the barcodes online and get an answer. Not always, but sometimes.

Allergies are a very real thing but so are Facebook hypochondriacs. Some marketing departments have little regard for either and will gladly label their products gluten free if it turns a higher profit. I had an online gaming companion that bought into the bullshit so hard, he was convinced a gluten free diet was curing his sons severe autism. Sigh.

I am bitching because the people that actually have issues always get left behind.

I doubt he got bored. That mechanical hand probably felt like someone else’s until the nerves fully adjusted.

After digging a little, I think I found the start of an answer to this. It shouldn’t come as a surprise that saline solution contains sodium chloride. (Basically table salt.) In some cases, there is a small risk of gluten cross-contamination in that salt which may lead to some irritation for people who are extremely gluten intolerant.

This research path immediately opened up a mess of search results that I have no interest in digging through and fact checking.

Based on some of those search results though, I would speculate that there may have been some kind of overblown social media scare about gluten in salt and some companies just started categorizing eyedrops as gluten free.

Then, most importantly, I lost interest in this topic. Cheers!

(The correctly used double negative was confusing for me at first, btw.)

You make a very interesting point I haven’t ever thought about before.

While I have always considered myself a patriot to a mild degree, I never associated it with tribalism directly. Even with the many faults of all countries, it’s OK to be proud of where you are from. (It does make perfect sense that tribalism is the end goal of state sponsored patriotism though.)

In my mind, the fine line after patriotism was usually nationalism where tribalism runs deep and hate-based rhetoric becomes extremely effective. The definition of a patriot is somewhat twisted at that point. (ie: unless you believe [insert something random], you aren’t actually a patriot and therefore an enemy of the state.)

I am not agreeing or disagreeing with you, btw. Your perspective is something interesting to think about, s’all. (I am leaning on the agreement side, FWIW.)

(For the people reading this that may not realize that I am using the word “nationalism” in a negative context, I am. If that chaps your hide still, replace it with ‘christian nationalism’ or ‘white nationalism’ and fuck off. Everyone else, sorry for the disclaimer.)

It’s “cheaper” from a margin perspective. They can still apply a standard margin on the milk and have the price be less because of the ~500% markup on the sodas. (Admittedly, you have to twist your brain a little to think this corporate accounting is the slightest bit logical.)

If they applied the same margin to the milk, people would go batshit crazy.

But to clarify, I was initially assuming these were school style boxed milks where the raw costs could be comparable. The actual reason the milk is cheaper was price fuckery.

The margin difference is significant when you factor in the retail price of the soda is $2.59 and the retail price of the milk at $1.50.

Culvers can’t pull off a 500% margin with the milk like they do with the soda and likely uses a standard margin of about 20%-25% which still comes out cheaper than a soda. (I have no idea what their margins are, so just guessing.)

I just edited the post above after I did a price check. The retail price of the milk was more than a dollar cheaper and the milk is likely going to be even cheaper due to wholesale pricing and less delivery risk.

Now the question is, why only a $0.31 discount?

It depends on the serving of milk. If it’s a larger sized milk or juice, it’s going to be more expensive like you say. If it’s a school sized box, the total cost should be much less. Small drink boxes can be had for < $0.20 wholesale depending on your location, which should challenge the total cost of a fountain drink. (Total cost is raw materials + employee time + delivery overhead and other factors.)

There isn’t a specific source for this other than googling a bit for wholesale school milk prices. The rest is just estimates for normal business and delivery overhead.

Edit: I saw the size of the milk you just posted for another comment. The cheapest retail price I saw for that was $1.50. Locally, the cost of a Culvers fountain drink is $2.59 for me.

Prepackaged kids drinks like milk or apple juice should be slightly lower in cost, take less time to include with a meal and are less prone to spillage in transit. The total cost for delivery is going to win even if the raw cost for the beverage is similar. (Milk and apple juice boxes are likely near zero profit and is already manufactured at brain numbing scales for schools already.)

Edit: OP just posted a picture of the milk and it isn’t school box sized. I did some price checks and the milk a dollar cheaper at retail pricing. ($1.50 vs $2.59)

The required drink is at a fixed base price. The price difference is because those drinks are cheaper, not healthier. (They likely come pre-boxed which likely reduces overall cost.)

Sugar-milk health benefits are probably subject to debate and apple juice is basically sugar water.

Of course they read. Do you think those ticked tock subtitles are going to read themselves when they “do their own research”?

I think a conversation about Hannah Montana Linux could be quite entertaining.

It was him! These guys were also the real Mark Twain:

It’s a camera and stickers like this one of many odd DEFCON traditions. (Security professionals in large numbers is an interesting sight to behold.)

Edit: Unrelated bit of history from the time: This also was the DEFCON where Marcus Hutchins was arrested. The fool come rolling in driving a Lambo for some reason so we kinda figured something was up.

(One of my favs from DEFCON a few years back.)

South Carolina is just a floppy extension of Myrtle Beach and mostly consists of the void you might need to cross to get to Georgia.

It’s a weird state. I am sure there are some nice parts, but for the most part, I can’t stand it.