Trainguyrom

I setup my wife's old Android phone to be super locked down via parental controls. Only approved apps, no installing apps, time limited etc. set it up so my kids can use it on days when we need them to zombify for a bit in the afternoons

Its kinda mind blowing how YouTube Kids is their go to and they don't move to any other apps until they've run out of time on it (family had already let the cat out of the bag about the existence of YouTube so I had to limit rather than block) and we still have had to block a number of concerning channels they kept watching. Its crazy how they'll just zombify staring at YouTube but then for the age appropriate games they're so much more engaged and actually seem to have a healthier interaction. Its also sad how some of the content I see the kids watching on YouTube Kids has writing and direction about on par with Disney's current crop of age appropriate shoes for 3-6 year olds (and from what I've seen Nickelodeon isn't much better right now). My kids primarily watch PBS Kids and a handful of shows we carefully selected on DVD because we want to minimize the brain rot (as well as minimize annoyance for us)

I mean, you'd lose most of the Appalachian Mountains which as one of the oldest mountain ranges in the world means losing a ton of ancient fossils that helped piece together the biological history of Earth. I'd also be curious how the glaciers would be impacted given how heavily they shaped much of North America

You also lose several major cities including Toronto and St Louis, Canada loses most of its habitable land (assuming the climate isn't significantly impacted by the existence of a second Mediterranean Sea, which it definitely would be) Chicago is going to be quite different but probably an even more important port city in such a world. Las Vegas is now a port city, so probably less casinos and more just major city. My wife would be sad because the Quad Cities (a metro area on the Iowa/Illinois border) wouldn't exist and she really likes that area. I'd be sad because the Mississippi River would be much short and therefore way less cool. But it's a really wild concept that gets crazier the more you think about it

The US is fucking huge...The US is larger than all of Europe, by quite a margin

It is hilarious to imagine if this were real. Like what would European explorers and Settlers have done if they started mapping it out and went "wait a minute..."

This is the real consideration, depending on your career so far, such a role might be easier just left off the resume. But they did say it was an internship so they likely have no good career experience to speak for. Personally, I'd aim for purely talking about the experience and just say that "the internship ended"

China was notably one of the last places on earth to retire steam locomotives from revenue service, only ending mainline steam in 2005 and reportedly ending the last branchline's use of steam in 2023, but may still have some revenue steam service surviving elsewhere

Bosnia still has some revenue steam service at a coal mine (notably running locomotives built by Germany using prisoner labor during WWII that were designed to use minimal resources and with a design life of only 10 years)

Reminds me of one of my favorite photos, a steam engine being delivered by steam engine!