Wednesday, November 27, 2024 →
Ian Welsh: The causes of the Ukraine war and What Ukraine looks like post-war if Russia imposes the peace. Welsh has an idiosyncratic view of the Ukraine war; I think he sees both sides as bad, but Ukraine is worse, and Russian victory is nearly inevitable. He makes a credible case, and I have to remember that everything I know about that war comes from Big Journalism.
Wednesday, November 27, 2024 →
Let’s All Take a Breath and Get Off the Plane Like Grown-Ups
I got in a shouting match with a guy last month over this issue — which, to be clear, means I was a jerk. I’m not proud of that moment.
Then, when I got home, I did some Internet research and determined I had been wrong about this for 35 years. But no more! I have learned! I am a new de-boarder! Or I will be the next time I fly.
Wednesday, November 27, 2024 →
Currently reading: The Closers by Michael Connelly 📚 Harry Bosch never disappoints.
Wednesday, November 27, 2024 →
Simplifying! I decided to stop posting to Threads, check in there only occasionally and consolidated my two personal newsletters into one. Also, I’m going to quit checking Reddit daily. I feel lighter already!
“I do not rip pages out of my notebook regularly because I am not deranged."
I suspect this advice on running different types of coin-op businesses is not intended seriously.
Cutting Through An Inundation of Dipshit Racists — The meaning behind the Maori haka demonstration in the New Zealand parliament.
Senators are calling for audit of TSA’s facial recognition tech as its use expands in airports.
A secret parachute in the FBI’s possession may have finally solved D.B. Cooper’s identity.
The children of a D.B. Cooper suspect handed over new evidence to the FBI because they think their dad was the culprit. A parachute long hidden on family property in North Carolina is said to match the type used in the only unsolved skyjacking in U.S. history.
Why’d the suspect hang on to the evidence, though?
“The Cold War never ended. And that is why we are where we are."
Ian Welsh: Why Assisted Suicide Bills Will Proliferate & Deaths Will Increase — “Nothing saves money on people who are old, disabled and unable to work like just killing them.”
Elon Musk has enough money to buy every federal election and still have plenty of money left over.
John Scalzi: Holden Caulfield in middle age. Like Scalzi, I never got the appeal of “Catcher in the Rye.” And my reasons were similar to his: I grew up reading science fiction.
If you were going to give me a teenage hero, give me Heinlein’s Starman Jones: He traveled the galaxy and memorized entire books of log tables and became Captain of a starship (for procedural reasons, granted). All Holden did was bitch, bitch, bitch.
Why is the sky dark at night?. The mystery stumped astronomers for centuries.
California’s farmers backed Trump, whose immigration policies could be dangerous to the state’s agriculture and the nation’s food supply. Half of California’s farmworkers are undocumented, and California grows half of America’s fruits and vegetables.
I stepped over one of the cats this afternoon and she panicked and bolted and I changed the direction my foot was coming down and she changed her direction and I stepped on her a little bit and nearly fell on my face and she bolted out of the room.
That was eight hours ago and we have not seen her since.
I’m sure she’s plotting to kill me.
I’ll be sleeping with one eye open.
Monday, November 25, 2024
I usually oppose Christmas decorations before Thanksgiving, but I’ll make an exception here because it’s so clever.
It’s on one side of a corner unit of a condo complex. On the other side is this toy village, which I’ve shared here before. I suspect the same creative person did both.
