Looks like we'll pay to have our privacy invaded - whether we want to or not

Eric Peters points out the downside to all these new-fangled car gadgets and systems.

There is a saying that goes, if you’re not paying for the product, you are the product. But what if you’re paying for it – and you’re still the product?

Welcome to your next new car – previewed at the Consumer Electronics Show in Vegas earlier this month – in which you’ll be surrounded by new technology designed to “monetize” everything from your musical preferences (it knows which stations you like) to where you like to go (it keeps track of where and when) and what you like to eat.

. . .

That data [will be] used to construct a pastiche of your inclinations, which will then be sold to a company interested in trying to sell you something based on that knowledge of your inclinations.

And the insurance mafia is interested as well. Have you been buckling up? Accelerating – or braking – “aggressively”? It’s no longer just between the two of you – you and your car.

Your car is now a narc – one you get to pay to narc you out.

. . .

One of the companies developing this tech, Eyeris, uses artificial intelligence in conjunction with the cameras and sensors – to calculate what you are likely to do based on what you’ve already done – and then take the appropriate steps to correct for “undesirable behavior.”

The Partie Line is, of course . . . saaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaafety.

You are to be monitored and catalogued for your own good, in your own car.

. . .

We are to have no say in the matter. We are like cattle given the “choice” of Chute A vs. Chute B – but never the option to leave the corral.

There's more at the link.

This infuriates me.  We can't even switch off many of these intrusive systems because, increasingly, the car's central computer won't allow it to be driven unless all its "safety" systems are operational.  I'm told that even putting a piece of tape over the in-car camera, pointed at the driver, will register as an error with the central computer, which won't let you drive off until the tape is removed.  I hope that's not the case, because if it is, I won't be able to drive anywhere!

I'm determined never to submit to this kind of intrusive monitoring.  I guess I'll just have to buy older cars lacking such technology, and keep them running as long as I can.  Fortunately, I'm at an age where I may be able to do so until I die . . . but younger people today will probably be S.O.L.

I resent, bitterly, the invasions of my privacy that have been growing year by year, allowing me no say in whether or not I'm prepared to permit them.  To the extent possible, I block them.  I'm an old-fashioned guy, who believes in personal privacy and is prepared to invest in it to the extent I can.  Unfortunately, such attitudes appear to be vanishing among modern young people.  They've been raised in an era of corporate and government intrusiveness, to such an extent that they see little or nothing wrong with it.  They even pay for voice-operated and/or "smart" gadgets in their homes, to make their lives more "convenient" - forgetting that those same gadgets can record anything and everything they do, and make it available to marketers and others.  Want a passionate evening with your lover?  If you have one of those gizmos in your bedroom, there will be a record of it - and who knows who may listen to it?  If a divorce results from your behavior, will a lawyer obtain a court order to get a copy of it, and play it in open court to prove infidelity?  What will that do to your reputation?

*Sigh* . . . I feel like a technological and ethical dinosaur.  Oh, well.  Extinction is something we all face, sooner or later.  I hope mine arrives before I become nothing more than a digit in the global, all-encompassing system.  At least I can go out extending a more appropriate digit to all concerned!




Peter

Some great Navy video

Courtesy of Chant du Depart, here's a video clip of Navy aircraft landing on carriers.

It's thought-provoking to realize that many of the hard-learned skills demonstrated in this video are slowly being automated, to the point that even a novice pilot may be able to land on a carrier in a few decades' time.  The computer systems aboard modern military aircraft and carriers "talk" to each other, coordinating the approach and landing, so that even at night, in a howling gale, driving rain and zero visibility, landings and takeoffs may eventually become "normal".

Peter

A non-apology - and he's quite right, IMHO

Matt Walsh is unapologetic about his views on the #MeToo brouhaha.

I was invited on Fox this morning to discuss that now infamous Gillette ad. During the course of that brief discussion, I criticized MeToo and said that I learned nothing from the movement because I already knew, and have always known, that it's not okay to abuse or harass women. I also pointed out that women would be pretty upset if some company released an advertisement lecturing them for bad stereotypical female behavior like gossiping, nagging, and shopping too much.

These comments were picked up by Media Matters and The Daily Beast, and I have since received a number of messages and emails from angry people — readers of those sites, I assume — who are upset and demand that I apologize. The bit about having learned nothing from Me Too seems to be the biggest sticking point. And it is for all of my comments on this issue, but that one comment in particular, that, after careful reflection, I have decided to officially and formally not apologize. I'm not sorry at all, even slightly.

. . .

It's not just that I learned nothing from MeToo, it's that nobody learned anything from MeToo. Men who don't harrass and abuse women already knew that they shouldn't (which is why they don't). Men who do or did harass and abuse women also already knew that they shouldn't. They did it anyway, because, in our flawed human nature, we often do things we know we aren't supposed to do. Very bad people do very bad things they know they shouldn't do. Sometimes those things are the worst sorts of things, like rape and murder. Rapists and murderers do not lack information. They are not confused. They are not short on awareness. Rather, they are short on morality and restraint and compassion and humanity and probably a dozen other things that an awareness campaign cannot provide them.

. . .

MeToo lumps every allegation of sexual misdeeds together and does not allow them to be evaluated on a case-by-case basis. This detracts from the seriousness of the really bad misdeeds and lends undue seriousness to minor misdeeds, and makes it difficult to distinguish between the two. Also, MeToo categorically prohibits any discussion of a woman's potential role in creating sexually inappropriate situations. Even less does it allow discussion of false allegations, which is a real and serious problem. Also, MeToo simplifies a complex issue, making innocent damsels out of women and cartoonish villains out of men. Sometimes women really are innocent and men really are villains. There can be grey areas, though, and there can be situations where the roles are entirely reversed. MeToo will not acknowledge that fact or make any allowances for it. There are other problems I could highlight, but you get the point.

There's more at the link.

I don't always agree with Matt Walsh's perspective, but in this case I think he's absolutely right.  We've demonized so many things under the #MeToo hashtag that it's become effectively meaningless.  Man opens door for a woman?  #MeToo!  Man invites woman to lunch?  #MeToo!  Man tries to kiss his date at the end of a pleasant evening together?  #MeToo!  I could go on, but you get the idea.

This has become a politically correct nightmare for far too many people, both male and female.  I don't intend to humor it - or those who proclaim it the loudest - to even the slightest extent.  I have better things to do with my time.  Deal with serious issues of sexual predation and harassment?  Sure.  I'll back those all the way.  Describe any and every male-female interaction in the same terms?  Get knotted.

Peter

Oh, well played, ma'am!

This news is a few years old, but I only just came across it:  so, even if it isn't Halloween, here it is.

We all have that one neighbor on the block who goes beyond the call of duty in terms of making the neighborhood festive for the holidays. And in Cleveland, Ohio that person is Amanda Destro Pierson, who turned her ordinary garage into something, dare we say, spooktacular. (Sorry, we had to...)

Just take a look at what happens when the garage door goes up.

There's more at the link.

Here's the video.

Clever!  I particularly like the warning notice outside.

Peter

The F word comes in for heavy play - but it's still very funny

Friends recently introduced me to the song "I've no more F****s to give", by banjolele player Thomas Benjamin Wild.  It's very rude (the F word pops up in almost every line, and sometimes more than once - in fact, the F word is the subject of the song!), but it's also extremely funny.  Those with a more scatological sense of humor, particularly those with a military background, will be rolling on the floor laughing.

I daren't embed the video here, this being a family-friendly blog, and it's most emphatically NOT SAFE FOR WORK!!!  However, if you're in a place where you can safely watch it without offending others, and the subject matter doesn't offend you, you'll find the video here.  Enjoy!

Peter

The downside of electronic drivers licenses

Miguel at Gun Free Zone made a good point yesterday.

Many states are now offering electronic drivers licenses, downloaded to your cellphone.  The idea is that if you need to identify yourself (say, during a traffic stop, or when voting), you simply call up the license and hand your cellphone to the nice officer.

That, right there, may be a problem if you've been stopped in the course of a law enforcement function.  You've just handed the officer your unlocked, fully accessible cellphone.  If you're arrested, the officer can now skim through anything and everything stored on that phone.  (It may or may not be legal for him to do so, but after the fact, excuses or extenuating circumstances can always be concocted.)  Even if you're innocent of any crime other than speeding, the officer may decide that there are grounds for suspicion (even if only in his own mind), and scroll through every one of your contacts, text messages, e-mails, etc.  You may never know he's done it, but your privacy will have been effectively shredded.  If that thought doesn't make you uncomfortable, it should.

For myself, I'm going to stick to the old-fashioned credit-card-sized physical drivers license.  I feel safer that way.

Peter

Subsidizing homelessness

The late President Ronald Reagan famously said, "If you want more of something, subsidize it; if you want less of something, tax it."  The truth of that dictum has been demonstrated many times in the past, and nowhere more clearly than the epidemic of homelessness affecting many US cities.  For example, City Journal reported last year:

Seattle is under siege. Over the past five years, the Emerald City has seen an explosion of homelessness, crime, and addiction. In its 2017 point-in-time count of the homeless, King County social-services agency All Home found 11,643 people sleeping in tents, cars, and emergency shelters. Property crime has risen to a rate two and a half times higher than Los Angeles’s and four times higher than New York City’s. Cleanup crews pick up tens of thousands of dirty needles from city streets and parks every year.

At the same time, according to the Puget Sound Business Journal, the Seattle metro area spends more than $1 billion fighting homelessness every year. That’s nearly $100,000 for every homeless man, woman, and child in King County, yet the crisis seems only to have deepened, with more addiction, more crime, and more tent encampments in residential neighborhoods. By any measure, the city’s efforts are not working.

Over the past year, I’ve spent time at city council meetings, political rallies, homeless encampments, and rehabilitation facilities, trying to understand how the government can spend so much money with so little effect ... for now, four ideological power centers frame Seattle’s homelessness debate. I’ll identify them as the socialists, the compassion brigades, the homeless-industrial complex, and the addiction evangelists. Together, they have dominated the local policy discussion, diverted hundreds of millions of dollars toward favored projects, and converted many well-intentioned voters to the politics of unlimited compassion. If we want to break through the failed status quo on homelessness in places like Seattle—and in Portland, San Francisco, and Los Angeles, too—we must first map the ideological battlefield, identify the flaws in our current policies, and rethink our assumptions.

There's more at the link.

$100,000 per homeless person, per year?  It'd be cheaper to pay every homeless person half that sum to go away and look after themselves!  How many people and organizations are funding themselves by demanding public funds to help the homeless?  I suspect most of those involved are doing precisely that, at taxpayer expense.

A business in San Diego is now standing up for its rights against the compassion fascists.  City Journal again, a few days ago:

Last month, the downtown San Diego franchise of the Burgerim restaurant chain closed its doors, contending that chaotic conditions caused by large numbers of homeless people in and around nearby Horton Plaza Park had driven customers away and made it impossible to operate, even during the Christmas season. The shuttering of the Burgerim location, which had been open for little over a year, was a warning signal to the San Diego business community—and to city hall, too. Burgerim would not be leaving quietly. The franchisee, backed by parent company Burgerim USA, intended to sue in state court, claiming that neither its landlord nor the City of San Diego had lived up to their responsibilities to keep the city’s historic Gaslamp Quarter clean and suitable for business.

Burgerim’s legal action will be of special interest to members of the multi-billion-dollar homelessness industry nationwide ... San Diego County’s homeless number about 8,500, which means this beautiful Southern Californian region has the nation’s fourth-largest homeless population (after New York, Los Angeles, and Seattle), a rank it has held for several years. The San Jose area is fifth.

Despite the many billions spent on homelessness, however, the problem is getting worse, especially in California. Along with homeless encampments come deadly outbreaks of hepatis A, typhus, and other communicable diseases, driven by attending drug addiction. Some parts of the city are littered with syringes. A desperate San Diego now steam-cleans its streets and sidewalks. Even in expensive neighborhoods, unguarded greenery is often strewn with trash and toilet paper, revealing where homeless people have spent the night. The city tries to keep the squalor at bay with improved shelter programs. It even plans to provide 500 bins, where the homeless can stash their belongings, but that effort alone will cost the city about $2 million a year in overtime for the cops who guard the lockers. Advocates suggest that these overtime millions could be better spent placing hundreds of homeless in their own studio apartments.

Will Burgerim’s lawsuit have any effect on this complex, expensive, and apparently intractable social issue? Can retail and restaurant tenants really use the courts to force landlords and municipal governments to protect them against a problem that no one seems able to solve?

Again, more at the link.

I think President Reagan provided the obvious solution in the quote that began this blog post. If we continue to subsidize homelessness, the problem will continue and get worse. That's already clearly visible in the movement of homeless people to cities and states where compassion fascists rule the roost. Those places offer more money to "help" the homeless: therefore, the homeless move there, to take advantage of their generosity. If you want to cut down on homelessness, stop subsidizing it. Before long, when it's no longer made viable by taxpayer dollars, many of the homeless will change their lifestyles.

Does that sound heartless? Does that solution appear to lack compassion? I beg to differ. I've worked with the homeless on city streets in both South Africa and the USA. I know something of the problem at first hand. Some of the homeless are certainly in need of institutional treatment, probably involuntary, because they're mentally ill. Some are drug addicts or alcoholics, homeless because all their income and assets have gone or are going to support their addiction. For those people, we need effective intervention, something that will either solve their problem, or remove them from the streets to places where they're less of a danger to others and themselves.  On the other hand, many of the homeless are shiftless and irresponsible in their lifestyles, preferring to do as little as possible to support themselves. They're only going to change if they have no alternative but to change . . . and as long as we subsidize their homelessness, we're not only enabling them, we're also enabling the legion of compassion fascists who live off our taxpayer dollars in an endless loop of trying to solve the insoluble problem. People have built entire careers off this issue, living for years, even decades, at taxpayer expense while accomplishing precisely nothing to actually solve the problem (as opposed to applying temporary panaceas that never work).

It's time we learned the lesson. Stop subsidizing homelessness.

Peter

Close call!

I received this video via an e-mail this morning.  It shows an encounter between a homeowner and a grizzly bear in Canada last October.  At the time, the Mirror reported:

An inquisitive grizzly bear was wandering close to a home in Bella Coola, Canada, with its three cubs, when homeowner Lawrence Michalchuk tried to scare him back in the woods.

Mr Michalchuk decided to shoot a warning shot into the air to get the animal off his property and it appeared to work, as all four animals started retreating.

. . .

Mr Michalchuk told CTV Vancouver that he ran out into the garden to "keep her moving".

He said: “As soon as I did that she just put her ears down and head back and came [at me] full blast."

Mr Michalchuk shot at the bear with a pellet in the leg, causing her to trip up, and giving him enough time to get away.

“Thank God it worked because it tripped her," he said.

“All I wanted to do is trip her. I dived in the door as quick as I could and I slammed the door and then she turned back towards her cubs.”

There's more at the link.

Here's the video.

That was a pretty close call.  Full marks to the homeowner for waiting until he couldn't miss, and knew the birdshot in his shotgun would hold together in a solid mass, providing maximum impact effect on the bear's leg.  Inexperienced shooters would have fired at too great a range, meaning that the shot would have spread and had minimal impact effect.  Even so, I wouldn't have gone out there by choice with a shotgun holding only one or two rounds - and it would have had Brenneke rifled slugs in it to confront a bear, not a lesser round like birdshot!




Peter

Focusing on the core mission - or losing a valuable capability?

I'm puzzled by a report that the US Army is closing down many of its watercraft systems and units.

U.S. Army Maritime capabilities will be radically reduced this year as the service deactivates and divests itself of numerous vessels, watercraft equipment, watercraft systems, Soldiers, and Units. At least eighteen (18) of its 35 Landing Craft Utility (LCU) will be sold off or transferred to the Defense Reutilization and Marketing Office (DRMO). Landing Craft Utility (LCU), a versatile 174- foot landing craft capable of carrying 500 tons of cargo, personnel and containers, is the workhorse of the Army Watercraft field.

. . .

Eight Army Reserve Watercraft Units and their civilian maintenance facilities are listed for closing. These Units represent hundreds of AGR (Active Reserve), TPU (Reserve), and Civilians. These units presently support, train, and deploy Army Watercraft Soldiers throughout the world, and maintain dozens of watercraft, from 70 ft. Small Tugs to 315 foot LSVs and Barge Derrick Cranes.

As stated in the Army’s Memo initiating this decision, “Army Watercraft Transformation Through Divestment of Capability and Force Structure by Inactivation of Units”, the intent is to “eliminate all United States Army Reserve and National Guard Bureau AWS (Army Watercraft Systems) capabilities and/or supporting structure”.

. . .

Army officials are also removing Watercraft positions within the assignment system, to ensure Soldiers in the future cannot be assigned to maritime duties, indicating there is no plan by the Army to reconsider their actions, or bring back a watercraft capability should the world situation change.

There's more at the link.

Here's an image of one of the 35 Runnymede-class LCU's currently in US Army service.  Malvern Hill was photographed in Alaskan waters.

I must admit, I'm puzzled by this decision.  I can understand the Army wanting to save money by getting rid of non-essential equipment, units and elements.  However, in most of the wars I've studied, water operations - crossing rivers and lakes, ferrying supplies along coastlines, rescuing survivors during emergencies and transporting relief supplies, etc. - have necessitated specialized transport units to perform them.  If that core capability is lost, or diminished to the point where it won't be able to cope with the demand for its services, where will the US Army turn when it needs it again - as it surely will?  I don't see competitors and/or potential enemies divesting themselves of their capabilities in that field, so why is our Army doing so?

Furthermore, the cost of maintaining a waterborne transport capability - particularly when it's operated largely by the Reserve - appears minuscule compared to that of many other units.  Isn't getting rid of it, or so drastically reducing it, a good example of being penny wise but pound foolish?  I felt the same over the Army's decision to deactivate its Long Range Surveillance capabilities a few years ago.  Historically, they've been needed often enough to indicate that they'll likely be needed again - but if they are, the Army will have to stand up that capability again from scratch, taking a lot of time and effort to do so when it may have neither to spare.

This decision is a puzzle.  If anyone can shed light on it, please tell us more in a comment to this blog post.

Peter

Doofus Of The Day #1,034

Today's award goes to a romantically challenged poacher in Oklahoma.

Game warden Cannon Harrison probably wasn't expecting to make his latest bust on a dating app. But that's what happened after he matched with an Oklahoma woman on Bumble.

As they struck up an online conversation, the woman immediately shared that she had just killed a "bigo" buck — "obviously not knowing Cannon is a game warden," wrote the Oklahoma Game Wardens in a Facebook post.

. . .

In the process, the woman, whose name was not released, revealed to Harrison that she had committed two illegal acts — shooting the deer with a rifle outside of rifle season and using a spotlight at night to help her shoot the deer ... Further investigation showed the woman had committed a third illegal act — harvesting only the head and back-strap meat of the animal. The woman and an accomplice pleaded guilty and paid $2,400 in fines, according to the Tulsa World.

The local community had plenty of jokes about the situation. "I'm pretty sure a court date wasn't the type of date she was looking for," wrote one commenter on Facebook.

There's more at the link.

Clearly, she needs to distinguish between "dear" and "deer" - and certainly not mention both on the same dating app!




Peter

A different perspective on the NRA

I've long been an opponent of the National Rifle Association.  My reasons are many.  Boiled down to main points, they include (but are not limited to):

• Rampant disrespect for its members by treating them as if they were a cash cow.  I rapidly grew to resent the seemingly endless phone calls, junk mail and other entreaties for funds, particularly at a time when my income was small enough that even affording the annual membership fee at my local range (which included a required NRA subscription) was tough enough.
• Apparent disregard for members' priorities, focusing on what the NRA considered important instead of what its grassroots supporters wanted.
• Trying to "muscle in" on others' turf, particularly when it came to claiming credit for gun rights victories (such as Heller) in which the NRA's initial involvement had been zero to minimal.
• Blatantly unethical behavior in the insurance marketplace by freezing out an existing vendor, with whom the NRA had a previous business relationship, so as to bring to market a directly competing product (which eventually proved to be a bridge too far for the organization, giving its enemies the opportunity to hamstring it legally and financially).

For those and other reasons, I didn't bother taking out an individual membership of the NRA when my range membership lapsed after I moved to another town, and I haven't bothered since.  I regarded the organization as a liability rather than an asset.

However, there's another approach.  Here's NRA Board Member Duane Liptak's perspective.

Is the NRA perfect? Oh, heck no! No organization is. But they are our only real chance. The NRA, with the help of the NSSF, also, has killed an actual AWB and magazine restrictions on the national level several times in the past few years alone. I, or our lobbyists, have seen it. No one else was even considered part of the conversation, regardless of posturing. We also wouldn’t have FOPA, and if anyone wants to complain about Hughes, which I hate as much as anyone, if you were currently living under GCA ’68, and had the chance to get the FOPA protections, but someone slipped in the Hughes amendment at the last minute to try to poison the bill, you’d still support passing it.

The NRA didn’t give you GCA ’68. They tried to minimize damage in another time when overwhelming support for even worse gun control existed after Kennedy and King were assassinated. NFA originally included handguns, also, and was in a similar period of hysteria about mob violence. Without the NRA and also the NSSF, we wouldn’t have had the Lawful Commerce in Arms act of 2005, and the entire firearms industry in the US would be out of business by now—sued into bankruptcy just by fending off lawsuits from Bloomberg lawyers.

There are a lot of wins there, but make no mistake…I want more, too. However…please understand that even with the R majority we had for the last two years... soft Rs like Flake, Rubio, and the other purple district congressmen and senators had us in a bad spot even then. Repealing the NFA, as much as I want that to die, has about 5% support in Congress right now. You’re not getting that legislatively unless you change out 95% of Congress, no matter how hard we could push for it, or how many “strong statements” anyone makes.

We are, in reality, barely hanging on to a slim majority of elected officials at the national level that even believes the 2A is an individual right!

The only path to right this course, especially with states like CA, CO, NJ, MA, NY, WA, etc., is through judicial review. And... love Trump or hate him, regardless of anything else he has done, if it were Hillary putting 2, possibly 3 judges on the USSC bench, the 2A would be dead in 10 years. That’s why NRA went all in with him. Not because he was a philosophically pure candidate on all of 2A, but because he was willing to put pro 2A judges on the bench, and because he could win. No one else on our side could, and the alternative—a Hillary presidency—would be disastrous.

. . .

I’ve seen too much NRA bashing lately by those who don’t know what’s even going on in DC. It’s a mess. I hate going there. But, the NRA is actually our best advocate there, regardless of what you think about some of the publicly stated positions. Making a press release that says, “We support repealing the NFA and doing away with the 4473 and all other remnants of GCA ’68,” doesn’t actually accomplish anything if you can’t produce results. It actually damages the ability to explain the real downsides of the issues that are at hand, with support, that need to be killed, because you won’t even get to talk to the people on the fence to make your case. Dems tend to ask for “common sense gun reform”, which we know means disarm America. Consider looking at NRA public statements through the same lens, in reverse. Maneuvering the swamp requires talking in less than absolute terms, even when behind the scenes, your goal is absolute.

There's more at the link.  Recommended reading, even if (as I do) you don't like the NRA.

I remain angry at the NRA for taking its members for granted, for appearing to be focusing far more on fund-raising and funding the lifestyle of its own executives rather than dealing with issues more important to its members, and other causes.  I'm still unlikely to take out an individual membership, much less a life membership;  but that's me, and I may well be wrong.  I think Mr. Liptak's perspective deserves attention, and perhaps the support of those less annoyed than I am.  I leave it up to my readers to make their own choice.

Peter

Another great restaurant find

Miss D. and I have found several very good restaurants by sheer happenstance during our travels, and enjoyed them immensely.  We ran into another one yesterday, on our way to Shreveport for a quick business trip.

Scrumbscious Burgers & Pieshakes is in a shopping center in Forney, TX, a little to the east of Dallas, just off US Highway 80.  Feeling hungry, we'd gotten off the highway and were idly glancing at restaurants as we drove through the parking area.  The place caught our eye, and on a whim we decided to try it.  We're glad we did!

Scrumbscious is a family business, run by a husband-and-wife team (with eight kids, no less, so one understands their urgent need to be able to produce large quantities of tasty food in short order!).  We wandered in to ask what a "pieshake" might be.  Turns out they offer a range of pies (chocolate creme, banana creme, coconut creme, sweet potato, peaches & creme, razzleberry, pecan, strawberry creme and vanilla creme) which can be either eaten in the traditional way, or whipped up with milk and cream into a shake.  Their pieshakes are apparently well-known at the Texas State Fair.  We sampled a chocolate creme pieshake, and it was very tasty.

Intrigued by the story and the atmosphere, we each ordered a Scrumbscious Burger, consisting of two giant patties and cheese with a range of trimmings.  They were IMMENSE!  They have to be the biggest burgers I've ever seen anywhere.

The owner assured us that there were twelve ounces of meat in each Scrumbscious Burger - but as Miss D. commented in an awed tone, she must mean cooked weight, not raw!  I'd swear there was more like a pound of meat in there.  There were a range of available toppings, some free, some at additional cost.  I went with grilled onions and mushrooms, and was very satisfied.  My wife had grilled onions and dill pickles.  Side dishes were sweet potato fries for her, onion rings for me - the best-seasoned onion rings I can ever remember eating, too, accompanied by a dipping sauce.  Delicious!

There was no way we could finish such immense portions, but we tried valiantly.  We were far too full for dessert, but wanted to sample the intriguingly named "razzleberry" pie (three different kinds of berry, combined in a single dish), so we ordered one to share.  It was extremely tasty, sweet but not cloying.

We ended up with three takeout boxes, which accompanied us the rest of the way to Shreveport.  We're tempted to drop in there again on the way back, to pick up takeout for our friends in north Texas;  but we have no way to keep the food hot and fresh on the drive home.  Pity about that.

We'll definitely be stopping at Scrumbscious again when we pass that way;  and if you find yourself east of Dallas, TX, it's well worth going out of your way to visit the restaurant.  Just make sure you're hungry when you get there!

Peter