IntenseDebate - rusty

8 years ago @ The Toast - Donation Confirmation · 0 replies · +33 points

I just want to photoshop a person with a tennis ball, winding up to throw it, on the right-hand side of the frame -- that's the dog-look this painting reminds me of.

9 years ago @ The Toast - Dad Magazine: April 20... · 1 reply · +9 points

A blog I read occasionally features irritated criticisms of the methodologies Consumer Reports used in recent issues (e.g. those special AA batteries calibrated for electronics http://blog.philbirnbaum.com/2015/02/rating-batte... which always carries the implicit dad-gripe "CR has really fallen off since the 70s."

9 years ago @ The Toast - I Can't Be The Only Pe... · 1 reply · +2 points

It's actually both simpler and weirder than that, if that makes sense -- you start by taking all your exemptions and deductions (e.g. children, mortgage and student loan interest, solar panel credits, and so on) to arrive at an "adjusted income" number, which is the amount that you're actually taxed. Instead of looking up brackets or calculating rates manually, there's a big multi-page table in the back of the instructions that lists a dollar amount of taxes corresponding to every income amount (to the nearest $50).

So in this year's edition (http://www.irs.gov/pub/irs-pdf/i1040a.pdf, pp. 61-72), if your adjusted income is $44,210, you owe $6,913 in taxes -- the actual marginal rates you're paying on the income isn't included in the same publication at all.

9 years ago @ The Toast - I Can't Be The Only Pe... · 3 replies · +21 points

IMO the complicated part isn't the marginal rates (everyone just looks it up in a tax table anyway), it's all the adjustments to income, deductions, exemptions, etc. And it seems like you could easily simplify that side of things without losing the progressivity of tax brackets. Ayn Rand is one thing, but a flat tax... /shudders

9 years ago @ The Toast - Owl Faces In Order · 0 replies · +24 points

This kinda makes me think of cuttlefish? (Which are, themselves, terrifying.)

9 years ago @ The Toast - You've Got Someone Who... · 0 replies · +10 points

Not sure which was more traumatizing when I left Colorado: learning that the Shane Co isn't local, or that Hyland Hills isn't the only Water World.

9 years ago @ The Toast - A Letter From Chris Ki... · 0 replies · +84 points

It's kind of fascinating how many layers of performance are going on when Chris Kimball puts on a gigantic foam lobster costume over his science apron over his folksy bowtie over his italian-made menswear.

9 years ago @ The Toast - Link Roundup · 1 reply · +2 points

I find the Doge version to be easier, somehow, than the regular version

9 years ago @ The Toast - Numbers That Should Ha... · 28 replies · +36 points

It may be too obvious (also definitely don't want to find out if it's on youtube), but family members gathered around to watch White Christmas one year, and apparently someone at the studio decided not to cut "I'd Rather See a Minstrel Show" from the re-issue. :(

9 years ago @ The Toast - The Best YouTube Video... · 0 replies · +5 points

"Snake-fed baby eaglets are more likely to survive in the wild than chicks raised on other foods."

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