They work. However they are a lot slower - by enough that no shipping company can compete using them. I'm not clear on if they scale to the size of modern ships either.
bluGill
Your odds of finding the winning ticket on the sidewalk about about the same as buying it. So I walk around once in a while looking for winning tickets. I haven't found one yet, but who knows. Bonus - I get some much needed exercise in the process.
one will close - but everyone will go to the other 3 on the intersection thus saving them for a few years. Then another.... and soon the one across town closing helps those left.
the average car is 12 years old so there is a lot of life left in gas stations even after all new cars are ev. once you have a station a lot of the costs are sunk costs so you won't close just because demand drops a little. Chains will build less as the numbers stop working but they will build in places for a while while closing other locations.
There are still a few stations without that, but it has been the norm for new or remodled stations for decades in the us.
Gas makes money. The margins are low - but the volumes are high. Most people are not buying what is inside so while margins are higher the profit is about the same
The US needs to be able to shoot down 2000 "things" per days, and likely far more. Ukraine proves that - they shot down almost that many UAVs just yesterday. Patriot is a part of that - Russia has launched a lot more than just low speed drones (though that is the majority), in enough that 1000 patriots per year is not enough even if they were a perfect 1 launch to on intercept (no misses, no training/test launches, and no launch two at one incoming just in case - I don't know how patriot is used but all of those seem reasonable).
We need to increase the patriot production capacity asap. We also should take Ukraine up on their offer. One Tomahawk (which can take out production of future drones/missiles) for 10 of their drones seems like a good trade for both.
When you first start translation is useful. However you need to get beyond that fast if you are to actually learn.
If you get too picky you will never find anyone. Loneliness can be worse than setteling for good enough. There is of course too bad, and this is all personal, but there are too many different things to look at to demand perfection in more than a couple places. Which things you demand is up to you of cousre.
There are several people who work on linux who live in California who thus are subject to California laws. There are people who don't live in California who sometimes travel to California and thus could be subject to those laws at times (see a lawyer)
Many projects are doing the "not for use in California" thing. I'd set the birthday to yesterday - it is the safest. This is only useful as a do-not-track, and kids get the best protection there. For anything else - kids are well able to change their birthday on the computer, so if you want to protect kids from harmful content (whatever that is - no two people agree if you dig deep enough) you need something that is stronger than a claimed age.
"you'll settle for whoever's around" is a compelling argument - if whoever is around happens to be good enough. Sometimes she is (I'm assuming she for discussion) good enough and so it doesn't matter. Also we have established living in the sticks is important (otherwise move to the city), and so you need to settle for someone who is willing to live in the sticks - that someone is likely already living in the sticks. Beware, I know more than one person who was burned on a relationship where she (in the cases I personally know it was she, but no reason it couldn't be he) was excited to move to the sticks - until she discovered how far it was to everything she liked about the city and the relationship wasn't worth that cost to her.
There are few places where the waitress sets you up. However that is more likely to happen in a rural area: everyone knows everyone, and they "want" to help each other. In cities everyone knows you also know people they don't and so they are somewhat less likely to do this (it still happens)
Money is easy to ship anywhere. Things are much harder. Thus everything worth doing is going to be local. Various options have been mentioned. Your local food shelf may have a place for this as well.