Torrefaction

My doctor gave me flonase nasal spray to take for a week or two while I get through the current Foo.  I don't like nasal sprays but this one doesn't sting, so yay.  However, it smells JUST like the smell of the cold roses in the fridge at the florist's - the way they smell at the florist, really, not how they smell when you get them home.  That odd combo of roses, refrigerants, wet foam blocks, and wax paper.  I don't exactly mind it because it reminds me of some happy errand-running times with Mom when I was a kid...but I also don't exactly like it. And I'm wondering if this is an added fragrance--eau de florist--or just a feature of the medicine.

I just read this interesting article on Seasteading. It seems a bit addle-pated to me, but I'm a liberal who believes in governance and regulation and whatnot, so what do I know.

http://gizmodo.com/393323/how-to-build-your-own-sea+based-country-for-fun-and-profit

I think a standalone society on an oil rig that was unassociated with any country beyond itself would attract every kind of aggressor, up to and including Reavers. But Patri Friedman, the guy interviewed in the article, waves that concern away:

"Also, the vast majority of piracy is restricted to a few areas, which we'd of course avoid."

Because if there's one thing pirates aren't willing to do, it's to relocate. I would think any sensible pirates would put your seasteading principles into practice by building themselves a nice skull-shaped island right around the corner from your community, and found a society based on the pirate code. Whereupon your own sea-based society, lacking naval or police support from an established State, would have to re-found itself on the sacred principle of Defense Against Pirates.

Sounds like a fun YA novel, actually.

[edited to remove the foul apostrophe that marauded its way into an instance of the word "pirates"]