There are precisely two instruments on this world I would try to learn:
the bag pipes
Because, to my knowledge, it it the most annoying instrument known to humanity. It’s loud, it’s screechy, it’s haunting, it’s everything hateful in a music instrument and yet it is so damn epic sounding.
the hurdy gurdy
Silly sounding name for an instrument capable of sending shivers down your spine.
It is also ridiculously cumbersome and unless you know what it is, the basic reaction to it is wondering if a piano, an accordion and a jack-in-the-box had a threesome and nature decided to create the musical instrument equivalent of the platypus.
I like this instrument so much I created a character for a story that is a necromancer bard, that conveys spells through the music of the hurdy gurdy.
I’ve known these for about… 4 or 5 years? I guess. Not much of a fast food client.
But these work. These really work. Less hands on the front, less confusion to deal with, the order goes from the customer hands to the kitchen: if something goes wrong with it, you fumbled it. And with less hands on the front, more hands can be in the back, preparing the cholesterol bombs.
Fresh onions, tomato and iceberg salad on almost every burger. Too much pickles, unfortunately.
But I would be a very poor host if I was to receive you in my country and treat you with McD. That is food you get to break the norm, not something you have daily, unless you are planning for a premature demise of your tasting buds.
I’ve been ordering deviations of the standard menu since I was introduced to McD in my teens and ever since I started paying for my own food I don’t really order basic menus but instead mix and match to my wims for the moment. I’m weird.
Can not remember ever getting a wrong order but I’m also aware my local McD has less items on the menu than, per comparison, the one from the US market.
So, perhaps a combination of luck and good service on my part?
I worked closely with an energy company for some time and enjoyed talking with the field maintenace personell and soon discovered that fable of sensible electronics on the power is just that.
Most of the power relies on hardware to control, distribute and protect the grid. And I mean old school hardware, not electronics.
The most electronic dependent part of the grid here is essentially on the end of the line, inside consumers homes, to measure and control the energy delivered and consumed.
Wild fires are more of a menace to power lines and energy distribution than thunderstorms or other massive energy discharges.