All posts by Nathan Ruffing

All, Comfort and Convenience Plagues

One Channel Versus Many

“TV is bad.” “TV saps your motivation and rots your brain.” “I don’t watch much TV (therefore I’m better than you).” “TV wastes time.” “Cable wastes money.” “There’s nothing on but trash.”

You’ve heard all that. I’m not going to beat those dead horses.

Cable TV

There is a milestone in the development of television that I believe often goes unnoticed and its societal impact under-estimated. That is cable TV and how cable is different from regular old antenna TV.

I lived in Rio de Janeiro Brazil for six months. Brazil has multiple channels, but for the most part, there is one channel to watch, Globo. The feel there was very different and it felt like lack of cable TV was largely responsible. I say “lack of cable TV” as an American born in 1983, but to them no cable TV – one channel – was normal, nothing to notice.

This is a bit of a rosy picture, but allow me some dramatization. It felt like one big family in Brazil with respect to the TV because everybody saw the same stuff. In Brazil, whether you love the TV darling Flamengo soccer team or not, they are the televised team and everybody watched. Love the current novela or not, everybody watches it at least a little, even in the bars. The news was limited to an hour because otherwise that’s all there would be.

The Good About One Channel

  • Everybody is on the same TV schedule, so it doesn’t get in the way of plans.
  • The news doesn’t have to sensationalize the news to compete with the others, so it is much less emotional and dramatic.
  • Less TV in general, that’s always good.
  • TV was kind of boring, so you didn’t pay much attention to it.
  • I enjoyed the two novelas that ran while I was there, “A Regra do Jogo” and “Velho Chico,” even though I struggled to understand. I was able to get lots of help though because everybody knew what was happening!

The Bad

  • Without competition, one outlet has a monopoly on politics and opinion. Many Brazilians felt like Globo was owned by specific parties and unfairly biased the news.
  • TV was kind of boring. Boring is bad I guess.

The Feeling

I have to admit these differences sound small, but the overall feeling and my perception that it was connected to cable television was really very strong. There was an overall ambiance that the collective attention was outside instead of inside, on others instead of self-focused. Even while actually watching TV, you knew that a good number of homes around were watching the same channel. If you could see in a neighbor’s window, you would see the same channel. If you go outside and run into somebody on the street, you would have just seen the same show. If you go to a bar, the only difference on the TV from your house is that 10 minutes had passed so it is likely later in the same show.

“Winter Storm Harper,” January 2019

I don’t know who started naming winter storms. It was kind of fun having everybody talking about the same thing, but it’s the weather, not the TV. However, instead of the weather – which was underwhelming – we were talking about the TV’s dramatization of the weather. Ridiculous. I heard the grocery stores ran out of food! Hilarious.

So by the way, when did we start naming winter storms?

“When ‘men’ started naming their penises.”

That’s the best answer I heard.

All, Rage and Frenzy Politics

Bigger Than Trump

Big News: Trump. Still Bigger: The Internet

Like him or not, Trump is the most powerful man in the world. He gets more attention globally than any other single person. His media coverage may be mostly negative, but they’re covering him, and more importantly, his coverage of the media is just as negative, and it matters. So what is bigger than Trump? The technopolitics that enabled him to turn the tables on the media and rise to the presidency are bigger than Trump.

The internet went public in August of 1991. The barrier to information dissemination dropped to zero. This is the defining event of our lives. This invention in the last decade of the 2nd millennium will be the defining event of the 3rd millennium. It seems old now after 25 years. It is not old. It is still brand new and its shock wave is still emanating.

The Only Thing Bigger: The Gutenberg Press

You will see a theme on this blog that the best historical analog to the internet is the Gutenberg Press. The movable type press was invented 500 years ago, which is a long time past, but like the internet does today, the press represented an exponential increase in the spread of information. Information spreading has far-reaching impacts. The details of the impacts are unpredictable, but the overall effect has direct historical precedence if you know what to look for and you look for general trends.

The Gutenberg Press, the first movable-type printing press that enabled documents to be copied by machine. Look at the changes that occurred within two centuries of the invention. The press fueled the Reformation that occurred from 1517 (Martin Luther’s 95 theses) to 1648 (end of the bloody Thirty Years’ War). The Reformation was a revolution of literacy and upended the monopoly on religion that the Catholic Church had held in Europe for more than a millennium.

Fake News, A Modern Inevitability

“Fake news” is one small example of the impact that information dissemination has. It is an example of the general trend of exposing corruption and eliminating information asymmetries that leads to tearing down of institutions. We could not have known that Donald Trump specifically would be elected, but we absolutely should have known that ideas would shatter powerful institutions like the established media, and the Republican and Democratic parties. “Fake news” is shattering the established media. The media reports Twitter. They have to. They have to report what Trump says on Twitter because 50 million people will hear what he says anyway, and is therefore by default, “news.”

What It Means

I don’t know exactly. I do know that the fall of institutions and the shift of power is not complete. The internet is still new and we need to pay attention to the technopolitics of what is happening to understand our modern world.

Solution

Get on Twitter. Participate on the internet. Don’t leave it to the power-hungry, narcisistic few YouTubers and Instagrammers. Hard to imagine, but I bet anything there were hold-outs when the Bible was first available to read in 1500. I bet there were many who refused to read Martin Luther’s 95 Theses in 1520. They missed out. We shouldn’t. Help me understand what is happening. Contribute your thoughts here at RageandFrenzy.com

All, Comfort and Convenience Plagues

The Car

The car. We travel mostly by car in our industrial world. Prior to the car, we traveled by horse, by walking, or not at all. As time passes and the memory of life without cars dies, considering life without cars becomes more and more radical-sounding. However, the car has transformed our lives for better and worse.

Timeline

1769: first steam-powered automobile.

1808: first internal combustion engine automobile, hydrogen-powered.

1870: first gasoline-powered combustion engine automobile.

1885: first production automobile, several copies made by Karl Benz.

1913: first car made on a moving assembly line, the Ford Model T.

The Good

  • Almost infinite mobility within range of a city.
  • Goods travel quickly.
  • Cars are extremely reliable today, inexpensive to own and operate.
  • Can visit friends and family far away easily.

The Bad

  • Enables sedentary lifestyle.
  • Driving alone Isolates from other people.
  • Expensive status symbol.
  • Cars are energy expensive.
  • Driving is statistically very risky, dangerous.
  • Enables us to live far from family and friends.

Keep the Good, Cut the Bad

Consider having one car for the family. At first glance, it appears extremely inconvenient or impossible, but imagine if you do not save the extra money from having just one car, and instead spend the extra money to alleviate the inconveniences. You could possibly:

  • Reduce or eliminate a second job.
  • Taxi / Uber when necessary.
  • Rent a car when you really need it.
  • Pay other parents real money to carpool your kids (while still using your one car to carpool sometimes).
  • Car time becomes family time with one car.
  • Nice bicycles to use for short commuting are cheap compared with a second car.
  • Afford a home closer to where you work and go to school.
All, Comfort and Convenience Plagues

Industrial Sugar

Sugar as we know it today is table sugar, which is refined sucrose.

Concentrated sugar includes cane sugar, beet sugar, and high-fructose corn syrup. To start, let’s just look at the overall change that has occurred.

Prior to the Industrial Revolution, sugar came from sugarcane, which grows in tropical climates and is native to southeast Asia. Sugar was expensive outside these regions and always labor-intensive to refine. The Greeks and Romans were aware of sugar, but they did not consider it a food, they considered it a medicine.

Sugar remained a plant by-product with limited refinement until the Industrial Revolution.

Timeline

1493, Christopher Columbus brought sugar to the New World from the Spanish Canary islands. Sugar fueled the African slave trade in the following centuries.

1747, German chemist Andreas Marggraf discovered sucrose in beet root, giving another plant source of sugar in addition to sugarcane.

1768, a steam engine first powered a sugar mill in Jamaica and thus began the industrial mechanization of the refinement of sugar.

Modern Effects

This has brought about cheap sugar, and desserts as sweet as we can desire that are often cheaper than traditional food, and made of sugar rather than sweetened by sugar.

Industrialized sugar refinement has brought about normalization of sugar as a food group. Even if you don’t eat candy, there are many other foods that are sweetened with huge amounts of sugar that we often consider to be normal food. Donuts for example, or soda as a drink to wash down a meal.

Solution

How to keep the good part of the industrial refinement of sugar without the unnatural extreme sweet diet? The answer is to have zero refined sugar inside your house. This rule might seem extreme, but by historical standards, refined sugar is an exception within our diets, a rarity. It is not normal to eat refined sugar regularly. Our bodies are not accustomed to it and it is not healthy.

All, Rage and Frenzy Politics

Populism, Polarization, and Social Media

We have a worldwide hate and polarization problem. The problem is perpetuated in the free information exchange that is modern social media, and specifically the irresponsible use of social media.

The Perceived Problem

Populist politicians have been elected recently whose primary message has been of exclusion, hate, and negativity. They whip up their base with rage and frenzy that is destructive even to their very selves. They often use social media to spread their message.

The Actual Problem

The perceived problem is the current politicians, as though they created the situation. While they may be part of the problem, the actual problem is the widespread irresponsible use of social media.

The Mainstream Media

The main stream media and press need only to take a side to win inspired viewers and therefore support the bottom line. Further, a new wag the dog situation has developed where the main stream media is following social media that is completely devoid of actual thought and has developed a vicious cycle where deeply polarized populations in turn produce more hate on social media.

Historical Context

The Reformation represented a fracture of long-standing institutions, for better or worse, and led to violent conflicts including the Thirty Years’ War. Both of these events followed the invention of the Gutenberg Press.

Donald Trump is the first world leader to be elected who used social media to spread his message. Like the Gutenberg Press, social media is a new, extremely efficient means of spreading ideas.

The Solution

The solution is for good intelligent people to take the extra moment to channel their political ideas and develop positive rhetoric on our youngest, most vulnerable forms of media that are just in their infancy. Good intelligent people should start WordPress blogs, contribute to this blog, and promote their productive, thoughtful blogs on social media in a positive way. This must be a group effort.

Editing Notes

The use of the word “populist” here clearly refers to right-wing movements. I seek a counter essay that lays out how both sides, or even just the left are using overly-simple basic instincts to garner votes, i.e. “populism.” Notice that they are just examples, not the primary problem. The solution here has to do with using social media responsibly, so keep in mind your solution must be similarly productive, whatever it may be.

All, Rage and Frenzy Politics

About Rage and Frenzy Politics

For all Rage and Frenzy Politics posts, click here.

Are you tired of polarized politics?

Do you feel like politics are getting worse and reaching a tipping point where they may actually result in violent conflict or the fall of governments?

Do you find that you are unable to discuss politics with the opposing side in a productive way?

Please direct your energy toward this project.

Mission

The mission of this politics category is to channel the frantic energy that has been whipped up by politicians, the media, and social media into something productive. The energy is there, this site provides the structure to channel both sides to common solutions using historical context, and constructive debate.

Goal

The specific goal is to produce one 500 word essay per 2 weeks on a current political topic, throughout 2019. The template below is provided as a guideline.

Essay Template

  • News story, or link to a news story.
  • Historical context for the situation, or link to relevant history.
  • The problem, perceived.
  • The problem, actual.
  • What the main stream media says.
  • Author’s opinion.
  • The solution to the problem.

Each essay must end with a solution. Other editing guidelines are as follows:

  • Full disclosure: this is edited by Nate. The goal is posts that both sides view as productive, even if they disagree.
  • Language used must be accurate and free of contentious political bias.
  • Some phrasing will be necessarily contentious. I’ll deal with that as it arises and be as transparent as I can.
  • Blaming politicians will not be tolerated. They don’t single-handedly cause major problems, and at least they are there participating, trying to contribute.
  • Electing a certain party over another is not a solution. You have to describe an actual policy, at least an overview.
  • Characterizing large groups of people as stupid, uneducated, or wrong is a waste of time.
  • Reference external material with links. This is the internet. You don’t have to rewrite everything and make another copy. Just link to it.
  • 500 words is short. The essay should be concise, and positive. It should not take a long time to write.

If an argument lasts more than five minutes then both sides are wrong. -Neil deGrasse Tyson

  • This is a debate that is made up of concise, 5 minute arguments. If the solution doesn’t work, we try something else and debate that.
  • Comments are allowed but limited to 140 characters. Don’t like that limit? Then write a post in the proper format. Don’t like that? Start your own blog.

The Name

Rage and frenzy will pull down more in half an hour than prudence, deliberation, and foresight can build up in a hundred years.-Edmund Burke, 1790 in reference to the French Revolution

Prefer Mud-Slinging?

For those who prefer that I just trash the media because it’s more fun, I’ll refer you to these quotes attributed to Thomas Jefferson:

https://www.intellectualtakeout.org/blog/thomas-jefferson-had-some-issues-newspapers/

All, Time v3

About Industrial Time

About Post-Industrial Time, click here.

The Fundamental Disruption of Industrial Time

Time, measuring the passage of time, and telling the time of day, are among the most fundamental aspects of human life. The Industrial Revolution changed how we tell time so fundamentally that we don’t even realize that there was ever another way. I call the current conventional format for measuring time “Industrial Time.”

You probably are familiar with Industrial Time as “time,” or “normal clocks,” or the answer to the question:

What time is it?

Our current time format is so widely adopted that it seems odd to give it a specific name to differentiate from another format for telling time – since we don’t currently use any other ways to tell time – but we should give it a name because it really is new. It is called “Industrial Time.”

Industrial Time and the Industrial Revolution

The Industrial Revolution has brought about such a pace of change that Industrial Time – despite its earth shaking consequences to our daily lives – is lost among numerous equally important and fundamental changes that we have quickly accepted as normal. What is really weird is we accept things so arbitrary and disconnected from natural reality simply because our lives are short and the generations that knew another way have died. The Industrial Revolution began around 1760, which at 25 years per generation, is about 10 generations past. 10 generations is not many, but it is enough to almost completely wipe away life experience of a different reality.

Our perception of the world is based on our own short realities. This works when the world remains the same for thousands of years at a time, but when the world changes fundamentally every two or three generations, we should make an effort to understand the changes. In my Industrial Change Surfing category, I consider industrial advancements that we accept as normal, even though they are all less than 10 generations old.

Post-Industrial Time

Click here for Post-Industrial Time clocks.

About Post-Industrial Time – click here.

All, Time v3

About Time v3 (Post-Industrial Time)

Post-Industrial Time, A Timeline of Progress

Time v1: Pre-Industrial Time, until ~1775

Without accurate clocks, one looks to the sun, stars, and moon as a reference for time. This is pre-industrial time.

Time v2: Industrial Time, 1775 – present

Captain James Cook, on his second voyage from 1772-1775 used a watch / chronometer, that cost a third as much as a ship cost at the time that was accurate enough to determine his longitude as he sailed around the world. The watch was called the K1. The K1 was designed by John Harrison, then Marcum Kendall successfully crafted a copy, and Kendall was rewarded by the British government. Basically, the K1 watch told Captain Cook that the sun was early or late as he traveled, something we would understand as “switching time zones.” Prior to this, Cook would have looked to the sun and not known “what time it is” in his home of England and would have continuously adjusted to the sun. By knowing “how early or late” the sun was, he had a steady reference, and Cook used the reference to calculate his longitude. Captain Cook continued to use the new watch for the rest of his travels as an indispensable navigational guide. This was the first time a person referenced a machine rather than celestial objects to determine the time. This is Industrial Time. This is the time format we are familiar with today. A century after Cook’s voyages, in 1884, at the International Meridian Conference, world leaders discussed and chose, …a meridian to be employed as a common zero of longitude and standard of time reckoning throughout the world. Time zones were born. Industrial Time calculated by machines effectively replaced nature to determine “what time it is” and we never looked back. Until now.

Time v3: 2018 and Beyond

Machines are now flexible enough to give us a time format that is accurate and precise while still remaining relevant to the natural world around us. Enter Time v3 (Post-Industrial Time). The time v3 at your location is: During the day, the amount of time, in the standard hours and minutes to which we are accustomed, since the sun rose. Sunrise occurs at time 00:00. Time v3 also includes the day length for reference. Sunset occurs when the time equals the day length. Midday is half that amount of time, and the sun will always be directly in the north or south at midday (or overhead). Example: The time is now sunrise plus hh:mm:ss. The day length is hh:mm. The night length is hh:mm. At night, the time v3 is the amount of time until the next sunrise. At night time v3 counts down from the total night length to zero. Example: The time is now sunrise minus hh:mm:ss. Tomorrow’s day length is hh:mm.

Time v3 Clocks for Various Locations Here

  You will immediately notice that post-industrial time is location-specific. It is meant to be used locally, only with people who are within a normal day’s commute of you. Within that space it varies only a few minutes. It can be used within a city and surrounding suburbs for example. It can be used to set the time that employees arrive at work in order to have them arrive at a reasonable hour with respect to nature, the whole year round. It is not useful for coordinating flight arrival times, phone calls outside your city, etcetera. Post-industrial time does not replace industrial time. Industrial time is still useful and in fact, industrial time makes it easy for computers to calculate post-industrial time. An exception is that post-industrial time will make daylight savings time changes obsolete. Post-industrial time needs industrial time, and it improves on industrial time. It uses industrial time and the flexibility of machines (computers) to give us a time that is more natural.

Post-Industrial Time, Live It Love It

Post-industrial time connects us with the people around us, who we can relate to in person, by bringing to attention what we share with our local friends: sunrise, sunset, midday, longer and shorter periods of light and darkness. Post-industrial time puts nature back where it belongs, ahead of the machines and our man-made conventions by measuring our industrial lives using natural events rather than measuring natural events with industrial inventions. Post-industrial time forces the machines to adapt to us, rather than the other way around by directing the machines to give us time that is based on nature. Post-industrial time is fun by shaking up something we thought to be older than the hills. Post-Industrial time is a better future by remembering the past.

Keep Industrial Time!

I am not opposed to Industrial Time. I believe it should remain, and Industrial Time should continue to be used in its current state in many situations. Industrial Time works well in an industrial, global world! However, Industrial Time is new, weird, arbitrary, and disconnected from the natural events it measures. It should be treated as such, and it should have its own name, Industrial Time.

Post-Industrial Time Clock Projects

  • https://nathanruffing.com/timev3/
  • Android app: currently on github
  • Javascript version for website: currently on github.
  • Contact nate@rr34.us for access to the repositories.
  • Physical clock on a Raspberry Pi: under development
  • i-phone app: Swift?
  • Aaron’s Raspberry Pi

For Developers

We are actively coding in order to enable the use of Post-Industrial Time with clocks.

Post-Industrial Time Coding Notes

At a given location, the post-industrial time is:

Daytime

If daytime at location, i.e. the sun is up / above the horizon. i.e. the most recent event was a sunrise rather than a sunset, then the post-industrial time is: Sunrise + hh:mm:ss. The day length is hh:mm. The night length is hh:mm. Where the sunrise is the most recent sunrise at that location. The total day length is included for the current period of daylight for reference.

Nighttime

If nighttime at location, i.e. the sun is down / below the horizon. i.e. the most recent event was a sunset rather than a sunrise, then the post-industrial time is: Sunrise – hh:mm:ss. Tomorrow’s day length is hh:mm. The night length is hh:mm. Where the sunrise referenced is the next sunrise to occur at that location, and the amount of time is the amount of time until that event. It counts down to zero at night. The total night length should also be included for the current period of nighttime.

The Polar Regions

The issue arises in the polar regions where the sun does not set during a particular industrial calendar date / rotation of the earth. When this is the case, the post-industrial time still continues to count up since the sun last rose above the horizon, and the day length is still the total time until the sun sets. Near the poles, the sun may remain above the horizon for months at a time. This means that the post-industrial time WOULD reach over 4,000 hours. Half of a year is 4,380 hours. In the polar regions, when the day length exceeds 24 hours, the unit “rotations” must be introduced and the post-industrial time becomes: Sunrise + rr:hh:mm:ss. The day length is rr:hh:mm. One rotation = 24 hours. *See note. This is required in order for the post-industrial time to continue to have meaning with respect to where the sun is in the sky. In the arctic region, the most recent sunset will have been in the south, and therefore the rr value will tick up approximately when the sun crosses south. As the sun circles around just above the horizon (arctic region), the sun will be in the west at about xx:06:xx:xx, north at ~xx:12:xx:xx, east at ~xx:18:xx:xx, cross south again at ~+1:00:xx:xx. This will be true for the entire duration of a multiple rotation day. Day length [should be?] within a few minutes of when the rr value ticks up and day lengths will be within a few minutes of multiples of 24 hour periods. *Note, this is all relative to the sun and not relative to the stars, don’t try to get clever and use a “sidereal day” for the number of rotations. The rotations are relative to the sun.

All, Nate TV, The Columbus Commuter Biker

The Ultimate Commuter Bike Two

Bike to work, because driving cars everywhere makes us soft and weak.

-Nathan Ruffing, January 2014, from The Ultimate Commuter Bike

On my last Ultimate Commuter Bike, I gave links to all of the products. It is very easy to find these items online, but I recommend that you go to your local bike store with this list and use it to order some of the items through the store. You get a lot of good advice buying at the store and learn a lot about bikes while you are there.

It has been 4+ years and thousands of miles since my last Ultimate Commuter Bike post, and I am still using the same bike and same gear after zero tune-ups and very little basic maintenance.

The Ultimate Commuter Bike 2 Video Tour

Frame / Bike

$400: Motobecane Fantom Cross Uno (or similar)

www.bikesdirect.com

If you can find that specific model, it is a great bike. Otherwise, there are many options out there. You are looking for:

  • Single speed, not fixed-gear, or “fixie.” Make sure it has the freewheel.
  • You will find them under cyclocross or hybrid bikes.

Good bikes are sized by the inseam length. My height is 186cm (6ft 1.5in) and I ride a 61cm bike. 61cm is a size up for me, but I like the larger bike. If you are over 6ft tall, you have to go to a bike shop just to get a bike that really fits. Cheap bikes are made for average height people only. With a proper bike, your legs will extend to the pedals the way they should and you will be more comfortable and efficient.

Single speed bikes are great because:

  • they are very very low maintenance,
  • you get a variety of exercise throughout the ride,
  • it naturally limits your speed. Most of my friends who ride have crashed at least once. Some crashed fast. Trust them, you want to crash slow. Single speeds go reasonable speeds.
  • unless you live in a mountainous area, or are pulling a trailer, you really don’t need the extra gears and moving parts.

Seat

$40: Sette Flex-V

Sette makes various cushion sizes of this seat. They are the best.

Tires

$80: (for both, $35-$40 each) Continental flat resistant tires

Continental makes tires that have a teflon guard against flats. They are not cheap, but they are worth it!

Write down the tire size that comes on your bike. 700c is very common and is roughly equivalent to 29″.

Gears

Again, you want a single-speed that freewheels. You do not want a “fixie.”

Pedals

$50: (+ bike shoes if you don’t have them) Crankbrothers Eggbeater clip-in pedals

Info on the Crankbrothers website.

These pedals are typically used for mountain biking. They are ideal for commuter biking because:

  • They are very easy to clip in and out.
  • They allow your foot to rotate, avoiding any knee issues you might have with clips that are too rigid.
  • They can get dirty.
  • You can walk almost normally with the shoes as the cleat is not very big.

Bag and Rack

$120: Topeak MTX Trunkbag DXP. $80 for the bag, $40 for the rack

Information from Topeak.

You want to get the rack and bag from the same company so that the attachment works properly.

Tool

$35: Topeak Alien II bike multi-tool

Cold Weather Gear

First, ride less in the cold because it’s cold. Keep all this stuff together so that it’s not a nuisance to find when you want to get out and ride.

Thick socks are nice, but feet get cold in wind. They make foot covers for rain that also block wind and would help when very cold. I haven’t gone to that length yet. My feet get cold.

You want a tight-fitting under layer like UnderArmor because the wind can’t get between the clothes and your skin.

You want good thick gloves and a balaclava that can fit under your helmet. You want to cover up all exposed skin. Any exposed skin will have a 20mph sustained wind.

You want to be a little cold starting the ride because if you sweat too much, you will be very cold when you slow or stop.

All, Around the World in Columbus

Momo Ghar Restaurant: From the Himalayan Mountains to Columbus

We are finally going Around the World in Columbus.

We start in Asia, high in the Himalayan mountain range, crunched between the Indian subcontinent and the Tibetan plateau, where they make delicious dumplings in sauce that has just the right amount of spice. The country there is Nepal, and it is 7,700 miles from Ohio, but fortunately the restaurant Momo Ghar is within biking distance on Morse Road, inside Saraga International Grocery Store.

I have been to Mo Mo Ghar a few times now and my favorite dumplings are the #5 dish, Kothey dumplings.

Momo Ghar is award winning:

While you are there, walk around the Saraga grocery store. Inside Saraga feels like a foreign country. Hard to describe, but anybody who has been overseas and also inside Saraga will agree. Which foreign country? I can’t say specifically, it depends on which aisle you are in!