Kickstart: Borgs assimilate onto college campuses

One-gallon high density polyethylene jugs are having a moment on college campuses — not for their original intended use as containers for milk or water, but for use as portable campus party beverages.

Called borgs (for blackout rage gallon, not the Star Trek: Next Generation villainous collective) they're typically defined as being made up of half vodka, half water and a splash of liquid or powdered flavoring and electrolytes.

Sounds like a parent's idea of a nightmare vision of their kids' college experience, right?

Not necessarily.

"At first it sounds like a recipe for disaster, but I think it could be looked at as a safer alternative [to binge drinking]," Tucker Woods, chair of the emergency department at Lenox Health Greenwich Village, told The New York Post. "It's a safer alternative … because the person is taking control of the alcohol content."

And because they can put a cap on the drink and keep an eye on it, they're less likely to have someone put an unwanted drug in it.

It's also likely to be safer than the communal trash can of alcohol some of us of a certain age recall from our college years.

Borgs are a "really solid harm reduction," Erin Monroe, a creator credentialed in substance abuse prevention, told NBC News.

The housing market in the U.S. has been on quite the ride the past few years. Early during the COVID-19 pandemic — as many office workers switched to remote work — Americans rushed to buy bigger homes with space for offices and workout rooms.

Then as inflation rose and the Federal Reserve raised interest rates, home sales and construction starts took a big drop. Expect that slide to continue this year, says Robert Dietz, chief economist for the National Association of Home Builders. But that trend may reverse itself again by 2024, as PN's Catherine Kavanaugh writes.

"With interest rates projected to normalize in the second half of 2023 … the pace of single-family construction will bottom out in the first half of 2023 and begin to improve in the latter part of the year," Dietz said. "This forward momentum will lead to a calendar year gain for single-family starts in 2024."

NAHB forecasts single-family home construction will drop to 744,000 units this year and then rebound to an annual pace of 925,000 units in 2024, Catherine writes.

But for homeowners who were priced out of the market, there is hope. The association is forecasting that home prices could fall as much as 15 percent in 2023 following a nearly 40 percent COVID-era gain.

Machinery maker Arburg is throwing open its doors March 8-11 for its centennial celebration in Lossburg, Germany.

Founded by Arthur Hehl and still run by the Hehl family, Arburg has already introduced the 100th anniversary edition injection molding press, the hybrid Allrounder 470 H.

Arburg started out by manufacturing surgical instruments in the cellar of Hehl's home. It produced its first injection molding press in 1954.

During the company's "Anniversary Days," invited visitors will also see the company's "think tank" in Lossburg with discussions on sustainability and digitalization.