Random Thoughts

[Max Rockatansky]

I wonder what Sidetrack Adventures guy would say about Temecula and Riverside being suburbs so Los Angeles?

[vdeane]

The mini baked chocolate chip cookies that Wegmans makes need to be on the controlled substances list.  They are highly addictive and have no medicinal use.

My random thought:  you seem to have a strange combination of {a} rigid routines about everything what you eat from day to day and {b} relatively weak self-control when it comes to junk foods.  This is fascinating to me, because I might have guessed that the rigid routines would help you to avoid the stuff you wish you could avoid.  Does it just boil down to impulse buying when you're at the store?  Do you make a grocery list before you go?

I learned the #1 rule of grocery shopping years ago:  don't shop hungry.

I'm generally good at avoiding buying stuff in the store, and there's no Wegmans around Albany in any case (although the cookie cake slices sold at my local Market 32 are way too tempting).  It's avoiding eating what I do buy that's the problem, especially as they exist outside my routine and so there's no case of "don't eat this today because it's for tomorrow".

In this case, it was a random quip I made at the family picnic as someone had brought in a pack of them in our selection of way too many desserts, which I then decided would be amusing to bring to the forum - and then I forgot about it for two days.  I only had six (so the equivalent of two regularly sized cookies) - this time - but it's a different situation between when they're part of a communal pack that I'm not responsible form (and in competition with everything else, including but not limited to Mom's carrot cake and a tray of brownies) and when I buy something for myself that I'm responsible for finishing before they dry out.  I do periodically buy them for work, though not recently, and I'm probably going to downsize the amount I do for that because the big cookie eaters got promoted out of the group or retired.  Plus I'm not in Wegmans territory anyways and my trips to Rochester tend not to feature time for me to pop over (without violating my routines on driving there and back); ironically, I'm more likely to buy cookies for the office on roadgeek trips more than anything else.

The rigid routines are really more about managing Aspergers/ADHD and my inability to "think on my feet" (as well as taking away the mental overhead of managing a pantry while being a picky eater) in combination with some OCD when it comes to stuff like what route I use to get in/out of the area or watching the news.  It doesn't take away cravings for things outside the routine, if anything it might make them worse by taking away any flexibility to handle cravings in a healthy way (not helped by the fact that I live on my own and have zero creativity about how to use things up).  In other words, the routine isn't because I'm naturally disciplined - it's because it's one of my own ways for compensating for the fact that I'm naturally the exact opposite, in combination with difficulty with "letting go" of past experiences that I liked and OCD.

Part of this might be that I never lost my sweet tooth like most people do when they grow up.  I still have the same taste for sweets as a five year old.  Portion control isn't a big tradition in my family either - quite the opposite, in fact.  One of the biggest shock my older relatives all describe when meeting the families of the people they married is how little food other families serve (that and how quiet they are).  And since I don't regularly buy dessert stuff (and things like those cookies tend to be sold in larger quantities than I can reasonably eat on my own before they start to dry out), there tends to be a mentality of "eat what you can now, you don't know when you'll get more or when it will be gone".

[I-57/Route 66 Fan]

Aurora is a suburb, it has Metra and Pace.

Having grown up during my early years in New Lenox, I thought it was obvious that Aurora was a suburb.  But apparently other people considered it to be too far out from Chicago.

When I was little kid, we did know a family in Joliet who had never been to Chicago a single time.

As long as it is connected to the city via public transportation and suburban sprawl, its a suburb

[kphoger]

I'm generally good at avoiding buying stuff in the store ... It's avoiding eating what I do buy that's the problem

I was going to ask, —Then why buy it in the first place, if you're good at avoiding that?  Or what's the problem, if you're just eating what you already planned to buy?

But then I got to the end and read ...

And since I don't regularly buy dessert stuff (and things like those cookies tend to be sold in larger quantities than I can reasonably eat on my own before they start to dry out), there tends to be a mentality of "eat what you can now, you don't know when you'll get more or when it will be gone".

... which I think kind of answers my questions.  If I'm understanding you correctly, you'd do a lot better if you could buy, say, three small packs of cookies instead of a big box of cookies—but the cookies you like only come in big boxes.  And likewise for other junk food items.  Kind of like, at a burger joint, —Well, I only really wanted about a dozen French fries but, since I've got half a plate full of them, I might as well eat them!

I understand that.  IIRC, you also really dislike letting food "go to waste", which resonates with me.  I've gotten better about that over the years, but I get it.

especially as they exist outside my routine and so there's no case of "don't eat this today because it's for tomorrow".

Well, you could do that!  Tuesdays are cookie days.  Fridays are for coffee cake.  Or whatever.

The rigid routines are really more about managing Aspergers/ADHD and my inability to "think on my feet" (as well as taking away the mental overhead of managing a pantry while being a picky eater) in combination with some OCD when it comes to stuff like what route I use to get in/out of the area or watching the news.  It doesn't take away cravings for things outside the routine, if anything it might make them worse by taking away any flexibility to handle cravings in a healthy way (not helped by the fact that I live on my own and have zero creativity about how to use things up).  In other words, the routine isn't because I'm naturally disciplined - it's because it's one of my own ways for compensating for the fact that I'm naturally the exact opposite, in combination with difficulty with "letting go" of past experiences that I liked and OCD.

Yes, I figured that.  I just thought that my post was already riding the line of being disrespectful and shaming you for mental issues you have little control over, so I didn't want to be the one to bring it up.

Part of this might be that I never lost my sweet tooth like most people do when they grow up.  I still have the same taste for sweets as a five year old.

Don't we all... 

Portion control isn't a big tradition in my family either - quite the opposite, in fact.  One of the biggest shock my older relatives all describe when meeting the families of the people they married is how little food other families serve (that and how quiet they are).

That's definitely a thing, from family to family.  I don't remember which friends of mine this was now, but one of the couples I know had a shocker when they got married to see what size of ice cream bowl the other naturally reached for.

[kphoger]

As long as it is connected to the city via public transportation and suburban sprawl, its a suburb

That's not an easy line to draw, though, especially the part about suburban sprawl.

Draw a literal line from Joliet to Chicago, for example, and it goes through plenty of farms.

Wayne's World came out in 1992.  Between 1990 and 2020, both Naperville and Aurora have nearly doubled in population (about an 80% increase).  A lot of that population growth landed in new communities that took the place of farmland.

[Max Rockatansky]

By that logic Madera and Hanford are suburbs of Fresno.  I drive down to the Amtrak station and hop on a train to either one. 

[I-57/Route 66 Fan]

By that logic Madera and Hanford are suburbs of Fresno.  I drive down to the Amtrak station and hop on a train to either one. 

Amtrak and Greyhound don't count as public transit.

[I-57/Route 66 Fan]

Is Laurel a Baltimore or Washington suburb?

[1995hoo]

By that logic Madera and Hanford are suburbs of Fresno.  I drive down to the Amtrak station and hop on a train to either one. 

Amtrak and Greyhound don't count as public transit.

Some people on this forum disagree. There was a dispute about that on the Mass Transit subforum at some point in the past.

[Max Rockatansky]

By that logic Madera and Hanford are suburbs of Fresno.  I drive down to the Amtrak station and hop on a train to either one. 

Amtrak and Greyhound don't count as public transit.

Some people on this forum disagree. There was a dispute about that on the Mass Transit subforum at some point in the past.

I'm gathering this person is largely just here to voice their opinions and pretty much disregard all others. 

[1995hoo]

By that logic Madera and Hanford are suburbs of Fresno.  I drive down to the Amtrak station and hop on a train to either one. 

Amtrak and Greyhound don't count as public transit.

Some people on this forum disagree. There was a dispute about that on the Mass Transit subforum at some point in the past.

I'm gathering this person is largely just here to voice their opinions and pretty much disregard all others. 

I mean, to be clear, I don't consider Amtrak or Greyhound to be either mass transit or public transit either, and the reason is because I think those terms are generally construed to mean something of a very different service type than what Amtrak and Greyhound provide.

But regarding the issue of accessibility from one place to another, I remember when WMATA (the DC-area transit authority) was adding places to subway stop names even though they were nowhere near the stop (most notably putting George Mason University on the name of the Vienna stop). I said, "Why stop there?" Pick the most distant point served by a nonstop flight from the airports the system serves and add those cities to the station names, such as "Ronald Reagan Washington National Airport—Seattle."

[Max Rockatansky]

By that logic Madera and Hanford are suburbs of Fresno.  I drive down to the Amtrak station and hop on a train to either one. 

Amtrak and Greyhound don't count as public transit.

Some people on this forum disagree. There was a dispute about that on the Mass Transit subforum at some point in the past.

I'm gathering this person is largely just here to voice their opinions and pretty much disregard all others. 

I mean, to be clear, I don't consider Amtrak or Greyhound to be either mass transit or public transit either, and the reason is because I think those terms are generally construed to mean something of a very different service type than what Amtrak and Greyhound provide.

But regarding the issue of accessibility from one place to another, I remember when WMATA (the DC-area transit authority) was adding places to subway stop names even though they were nowhere near the stop (most notably putting George Mason University on the name of the Vienna stop). I said, "Why stop there?" Pick the most distant point served by a nonstop flight from the airports the system serves and add those cities to the station names, such as "Ronald Reagan Washington National Airport—Seattle."

I don't have a dog in the fight per se regarding Amtrak.  I'm more referring back to this "what defines a Southern California suburb" business that keeps coming up. 

Although, I can schedule my own stop and pickup at Allensworth via Amtrak.  I can't really think of another example where you can schedule stops at a ghost town like that?  I do find some amusement in the argument that somehow that would make Allensworth a suburb of anything.   

[kphoger]

Amtrak and Greyhound don't count as public transit.

This seems rather arbitrary: