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Bill Bailey on the difference between major and minor musical keys. He's a brilliant comedian and I'd love to see him live. I always enjoy seeing this clip.
This looks like so much fun! Releasing on Netflix in the middle of December, also having a limited run in 70mm theaters.
https://arstechnica.com/culture/2026/09/netflix-drops-trailer-for-brad-birds-ray-gunn/
How the hell they didn't catch this in testing, I cannot understand. Unless they did pretty much zero testing.
Fortunately the damage seems to be confined to South Korea. Unfortunately South Korea is a major connected appliance base. And seriously unfortunately, it's time for SK's Chuseok/fall harvest festival, roughly analogous to Thanksgiving and the like. And now who knows how many refrigerators are completely dead and are having their complete contents tossed.
The update was released Tuesday, and calls started coming in immediately. There's not remotely enough repairmen to handle the number of dead appliances in a sufficiently timely fashion, especially at the beginning of Chuseok when the repairmen will be taking time off.
The big problem being that Samsung did not design the appliances to 'fail safe' and switch to a dumb control mode where a simple thermostat takes over refrigerator control if the smart side should fail, which would be a smart thing to do. Instead they put all their trust in the smart side never failing, which was incredibly stupid.
Most of these fridges were purchased in 2024 or later, many are less than a year old. It will be interesting to see what Samsung does in terms of restitution.
Personally, in most cases I don't see a use case for "smart" or connected appliances, especially refrigerators. A camera inside your fridge so you can look at what you need when you're at the store when you can make a list for shopping? You're adding needless complexity. I can see a case for washer/dryer connectivity for deaf people or where you have a multi-story house and the laundry is in the basement. But overall, it is definitely not a technology for me.
Give me dumb appliances! The only stuff connected to the internet in my house is computer equipment and my Apple TV.
https://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2026/09/owners-mourn-spoiled-food-after-firmware-update-bricks-samsung-smart-fridges/
Fortunately the damage seems to be confined to South Korea. Unfortunately South Korea is a major connected appliance base. And seriously unfortunately, it's time for SK's Chuseok/fall harvest festival, roughly analogous to Thanksgiving and the like. And now who knows how many refrigerators are completely dead and are having their complete contents tossed.
The update was released Tuesday, and calls started coming in immediately. There's not remotely enough repairmen to handle the number of dead appliances in a sufficiently timely fashion, especially at the beginning of Chuseok when the repairmen will be taking time off.
The big problem being that Samsung did not design the appliances to 'fail safe' and switch to a dumb control mode where a simple thermostat takes over refrigerator control if the smart side should fail, which would be a smart thing to do. Instead they put all their trust in the smart side never failing, which was incredibly stupid.
Most of these fridges were purchased in 2024 or later, many are less than a year old. It will be interesting to see what Samsung does in terms of restitution.
Personally, in most cases I don't see a use case for "smart" or connected appliances, especially refrigerators. A camera inside your fridge so you can look at what you need when you're at the store when you can make a list for shopping? You're adding needless complexity. I can see a case for washer/dryer connectivity for deaf people or where you have a multi-story house and the laundry is in the basement. But overall, it is definitely not a technology for me.
Give me dumb appliances! The only stuff connected to the internet in my house is computer equipment and my Apple TV.
https://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2026/09/owners-mourn-spoiled-food-after-firmware-update-bricks-samsung-smart-fridges/
Plumbing fixed!
Sep. 23rd, 2026 09:49 pmMonday I called our preferred plumber, and was told that they had a guy on the mountain that day and he'd get ahold of me. Russet has a crew in from NASA Goddard this week, so she's been working days, and I had an appointment down the mountain that I had to leave for at 1:45. The guy never got ahold of me before I had to leave.
Tuesday I called two backup plumbers. Neither had any immediate availabilities. One had two recommendations for others. I recognized one and called them: they could have a guy out Wednesday afternoon - I took it! I would have taken the morning but had a rescheduled hearing aid appointment that I'd been waiting over a month for.
Came back from my appointment, was literally sitting in my car after parking and received the call from the plumber, he was on his way up the mountain! He arrived and replaced two feet of pipe and completed everything in half an hour!
Total out of pocket, excluding the higher water bill we'll have next month, just under $160. Very comparable, possibly less expensive, than what our normal plumber would charge. Definitely satisfied.
Tuesday I called two backup plumbers. Neither had any immediate availabilities. One had two recommendations for others. I recognized one and called them: they could have a guy out Wednesday afternoon - I took it! I would have taken the morning but had a rescheduled hearing aid appointment that I'd been waiting over a month for.
Came back from my appointment, was literally sitting in my car after parking and received the call from the plumber, he was on his way up the mountain! He arrived and replaced two feet of pipe and completed everything in half an hour!
Total out of pocket, excluding the higher water bill we'll have next month, just under $160. Very comparable, possibly less expensive, than what our normal plumber would charge. Definitely satisfied.
In February, on the first day of Trumptydumpty's undeclared war on Iran, there was a strike on the Shajarah Tayyebeh Elementary School in the town of Minab. It's been broadly discussed that the strike was based on bad data, that it used to be an Iranian Revolutionary Guards post, which could be considered a valid target. And originally the school was within the perimeter of the Guards' compound.
But over a decade ago that changed. The compound perimeter was changed, slicing out the school. Walls were built around it that had three access portals, none with guard posts, also the walls were painted pink and blue to denote the girls and boys sides.
In an unreleased report, the strike planners used a Palantir AI tool called Maven, which did not note that it was no longer a Guards site. Nor did it flag it for human review. Apparently users of Maven expected the system to flag such invalid targets, targets that include things like hospitals, etc., but it would seem that particular functionality was never there to begin with. Palantir, after the school bombing, did at that human review alert in.
The strike planners were also using outdated satellite imagery to identify the target. In 2018 images, it plainly shows the demarcation between the school and the Guards compound and the erection of the wall, along with the construction of a football pitch (soccer) and other children's recreational equipment. The school also had its own web site and appeared on Google Maps.
A different analyst noted the changes to the school in 2019 and logged them into a computer system, but it wasn't accessed by the strike planners.
So basically there were multiple failures and no reason why the school was targeted and all those children killed.
And a particularly telling paragraph from the article: "Staffing on civilian harm mitigation teams across the U.S. Department of Defense had also fallen by roughly 90% over recent years, shrinking to fewer than 20 people overall. Centcom’s group shrank from 10 people to one. No member of those teams reviewed the Minab site before the missiles were up in the air." I'm curious how long 'recent years' are.
Who needs civilian harm mitigation teams? The military's job is to blow shit up and kill!
A recently released U.N. preliminary report says that "there were reasonable grounds to believe the United States committed the war crime of launching an indiscriminate attack. It found the U.S. “failed in its obligation to do everything feasible to verify” that the school was a military objective and that the failure “went beyond mere negligence.” The report said the United States “directed the strikes at the building of the school while being aware of a substantial risk of striking a civilian object and acting recklessly as regards the possibility that this would happen.”
Maven is still used regularly for strike package creation.
https://gizmodo.com/pentagon-investigators-say-overreliance-on-palantir-ai-tech-contributed-to-u-s-strike-that-killed-123-iranian-children-2000814477
But over a decade ago that changed. The compound perimeter was changed, slicing out the school. Walls were built around it that had three access portals, none with guard posts, also the walls were painted pink and blue to denote the girls and boys sides.
In an unreleased report, the strike planners used a Palantir AI tool called Maven, which did not note that it was no longer a Guards site. Nor did it flag it for human review. Apparently users of Maven expected the system to flag such invalid targets, targets that include things like hospitals, etc., but it would seem that particular functionality was never there to begin with. Palantir, after the school bombing, did at that human review alert in.
The strike planners were also using outdated satellite imagery to identify the target. In 2018 images, it plainly shows the demarcation between the school and the Guards compound and the erection of the wall, along with the construction of a football pitch (soccer) and other children's recreational equipment. The school also had its own web site and appeared on Google Maps.
A different analyst noted the changes to the school in 2019 and logged them into a computer system, but it wasn't accessed by the strike planners.
So basically there were multiple failures and no reason why the school was targeted and all those children killed.
And a particularly telling paragraph from the article: "Staffing on civilian harm mitigation teams across the U.S. Department of Defense had also fallen by roughly 90% over recent years, shrinking to fewer than 20 people overall. Centcom’s group shrank from 10 people to one. No member of those teams reviewed the Minab site before the missiles were up in the air." I'm curious how long 'recent years' are.
Who needs civilian harm mitigation teams? The military's job is to blow shit up and kill!
A recently released U.N. preliminary report says that "there were reasonable grounds to believe the United States committed the war crime of launching an indiscriminate attack. It found the U.S. “failed in its obligation to do everything feasible to verify” that the school was a military objective and that the failure “went beyond mere negligence.” The report said the United States “directed the strikes at the building of the school while being aware of a substantial risk of striking a civilian object and acting recklessly as regards the possibility that this would happen.”
Maven is still used regularly for strike package creation.
https://gizmodo.com/pentagon-investigators-say-overreliance-on-palantir-ai-tech-contributed-to-u-s-strike-that-killed-123-iranian-children-2000814477
Two Star Trek geeks and now long-time Hollywood actors sit down to gossip, and bring in other people to join them! The show started early this year and runs about twice a month, so not a huge number of episodes to catch up on if you're a completionist.
Guests have included: LeVar Burton, Nathan Fillion and Alan Tudyk, Felicia Day, Joel McHale, Ron Perlman, Bill Prady (creator of The Big Bang Theory), Michael Dorn, Tim Matheson, Michelle Hurd, and Wil Wheaton. I learned of the show when Wil announced his appearance on it on his blog.
I actually haven't listened to any yet, I just downloaded it today and shall commence this afternoon. But I expect it's excellent as Spiner and Frakes (sounds like a Vaudeville act!) are very entertaining peeps.
Available wherever finer free podcasts are sold.
https://droppingnames.com/
Guests have included: LeVar Burton, Nathan Fillion and Alan Tudyk, Felicia Day, Joel McHale, Ron Perlman, Bill Prady (creator of The Big Bang Theory), Michael Dorn, Tim Matheson, Michelle Hurd, and Wil Wheaton. I learned of the show when Wil announced his appearance on it on his blog.
I actually haven't listened to any yet, I just downloaded it today and shall commence this afternoon. But I expect it's excellent as Spiner and Frakes (sounds like a Vaudeville act!) are very entertaining peeps.
Available wherever finer free podcasts are sold.
https://droppingnames.com/
If we're in town and don't have any specific plans, on Sunday I'll go into the village (we live in what is legally defined as a village, population a bit above 800) and hit the sandwich shop for food, which includes clam chowder. It's good chowder, and it probably comes from Sysco, but its good none the less. The chowder is really what drives us to get the sandwiches as it's only available on Sunday.
So off I go with Charlie riding shotgun. Get the food, come back, and the twist begins: there's a Village of Cloudcroft utility truck parked in front of the house. And when it comes to municipal utilities, it's pretty much always concerning water.
And boy, did it concern water!
It seems we have a leak of which we were not aware. A leak to the tune of A LITER A MINUTE!!! We have identified where the leak is, but obviously getting someone out on a Sunday is a non-starter. And it's apparent this has been going on for some time, I don't know why the utility office didn't just call me as soon as they noticed. They installed new meters that they know when leaks like this are happening, so why let it run?!
We know it's been happening for a while because Russet has been complaining of a smell in the master bath, which is right next to the water heater. The water is pooling under the bathroom and that stagnant smell is infiltrating the house: we're in a manufactured house, and it's not sealed the best against the outside. Plus the bathtub has a crack, so there's another place for the fouled air to get in.
So first thing tomorrow I'll be calling a plumber. The problem is, Russet is going in to the observatory in the morning, and I'm going down to Alamogordo for a couple of hours in the afternoon, so there's pretty much no way to schedule it. And it's probable that the plumbers that we prefer to use are completely booked for Monday. If they can't get out Tuesday early, then we'll probably shut off water to the house and go down and stay in a hotel in Alamo or perhaps Cloudcroft until they can get out and fix it. Not a desirable thing, but needs must. That's just too much water, and it's impractical to be going back and forth turning the water to the house on and off.
The leak seems to be directly under the heater, so it's probably the right-angle elbow where the pipe starts running under the house to the various places where it's needed.
So off I go with Charlie riding shotgun. Get the food, come back, and the twist begins: there's a Village of Cloudcroft utility truck parked in front of the house. And when it comes to municipal utilities, it's pretty much always concerning water.
And boy, did it concern water!
It seems we have a leak of which we were not aware. A leak to the tune of A LITER A MINUTE!!! We have identified where the leak is, but obviously getting someone out on a Sunday is a non-starter. And it's apparent this has been going on for some time, I don't know why the utility office didn't just call me as soon as they noticed. They installed new meters that they know when leaks like this are happening, so why let it run?!
We know it's been happening for a while because Russet has been complaining of a smell in the master bath, which is right next to the water heater. The water is pooling under the bathroom and that stagnant smell is infiltrating the house: we're in a manufactured house, and it's not sealed the best against the outside. Plus the bathtub has a crack, so there's another place for the fouled air to get in.
So first thing tomorrow I'll be calling a plumber. The problem is, Russet is going in to the observatory in the morning, and I'm going down to Alamogordo for a couple of hours in the afternoon, so there's pretty much no way to schedule it. And it's probable that the plumbers that we prefer to use are completely booked for Monday. If they can't get out Tuesday early, then we'll probably shut off water to the house and go down and stay in a hotel in Alamo or perhaps Cloudcroft until they can get out and fix it. Not a desirable thing, but needs must. That's just too much water, and it's impractical to be going back and forth turning the water to the house on and off.
The leak seems to be directly under the heater, so it's probably the right-angle elbow where the pipe starts running under the house to the various places where it's needed.
Paramount, which now includes (or will soon include) Warner Brothers, HBO, CNN, and CBS, and who knows what else, is selling just under half of its Class B shares to the sovereign wealth funds of Saudi Arabia, Qatar, and the United Arab Emirates. Class B shares are "Non-Voting", all of the Class A voting shares are held by the Ellisons. Larry Ellison was the co-founder of Oracle and his son is now the owner of this CBS/Paramount/Warner Bros mess.
So all is well. After all, those Arab states won't be able to vote and influence programming or editorial content! Excuse me while I retch. If they were to dump all that stock in one concerted move, it would be catastrophic to the stock. They will be an invisible hand influencing things. There are some interesting comments in the Ars Technica article about various ways this can play out, the most likely way is producer bias influencing 60 Minutes and CNN, and possibly leaving HBO's This Week Tonight With John Oliver alone as a fig leaf since that show is largely preaching to the converted.
It's also entirely possible that any or all of those three Arab states have managed to covertly purchase 0.6% stock on the sly, and when the sale goes through, will actually own 50.1% of the stock. No one knows.
Under normal rule enforcement, no single block of shares greater than 25% can be controlled by a single entity. But we're not in normal times. The FCC didn't even approve this as a board measure, where it would be open to public comment and a vote. They did it as an administrative issue, just *POOF* and they're good to go.
It's not in the least bit surprising as the Arab world has been shoveling money into the current administration at regular intervals. Trumpty-Dumpty wants to build resorts over there, so they're buying getting to buy influence over here.
Another fly in the mix is that Larry Ellison is on the hook for a huge revenue shortfall at Oracle over the massive Jupiter data centers that he's building to lease out to tenants who want AI resources. The construction is pretty slow because everyone's trying to build data centers, and there's a shortage of a number of key parts needed for them, only partly related to the servers themselves: we're talking about power transformers, generators, etc. Oracle just did another round of layoffs last week and their stock is taking a beating.
Such a lovely world.
https://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2026/09/fcc-lets-paramount-sell-49-5-equity-stake-to-saudi-arabia-uae-and-qatar/
So all is well. After all, those Arab states won't be able to vote and influence programming or editorial content! Excuse me while I retch. If they were to dump all that stock in one concerted move, it would be catastrophic to the stock. They will be an invisible hand influencing things. There are some interesting comments in the Ars Technica article about various ways this can play out, the most likely way is producer bias influencing 60 Minutes and CNN, and possibly leaving HBO's This Week Tonight With John Oliver alone as a fig leaf since that show is largely preaching to the converted.
It's also entirely possible that any or all of those three Arab states have managed to covertly purchase 0.6% stock on the sly, and when the sale goes through, will actually own 50.1% of the stock. No one knows.
Under normal rule enforcement, no single block of shares greater than 25% can be controlled by a single entity. But we're not in normal times. The FCC didn't even approve this as a board measure, where it would be open to public comment and a vote. They did it as an administrative issue, just *POOF* and they're good to go.
It's not in the least bit surprising as the Arab world has been shoveling money into the current administration at regular intervals. Trumpty-Dumpty wants to build resorts over there, so they're buying getting to buy influence over here.
Another fly in the mix is that Larry Ellison is on the hook for a huge revenue shortfall at Oracle over the massive Jupiter data centers that he's building to lease out to tenants who want AI resources. The construction is pretty slow because everyone's trying to build data centers, and there's a shortage of a number of key parts needed for them, only partly related to the servers themselves: we're talking about power transformers, generators, etc. Oracle just did another round of layoffs last week and their stock is taking a beating.
Such a lovely world.
https://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2026/09/fcc-lets-paramount-sell-49-5-equity-stake-to-saudi-arabia-uae-and-qatar/
First off, as a refresher and for those late to the show, what is the Vesuvius Challenge? When the Italian volcano Mount Vesuvius erupted in 79 AD, it took out the city of Pompei. It also took out several neighboring villages and towns, such as Herculaneum. In the 1700s, during an archeological dig at the Herculaneum site, researchers got into a room that contained a vast number of scrolls that are now believed to have been the library of a rich philosopher.
But they weren't scrolls per se, they were essentially charcoal briquettes. The eruptions' pyroclastic blast and flow had flashed them from papyrus to charcoal in an instant, rendering them too fragile to touch, much less to consider unrolling. The merest touch would cause them to disintegrate.
The Vesuvius Challenge was started as an attempt to make radical new approaches with modern non-invasive scanning technology to 'unroll' these briquettes electronically using CTs, MRIs, whatever people could bring to bear along with software to make them readable.
A prize of $700,000 was awarded a few years ago for one such effort.
Well, progress has been on-going and another major advancement has been achieved.
A retired SETI engineer heard about the problem these researchers were having and got involved. Being involved in SETI, he was familiar with the problem of low signal-to-noise ratios: the scans got very little signal and an awful lot of noise, and had to try to improve the signal to get meaningful data. This was his field!
He started with buying modern papyrus from Egypt that was largely made using the same process used 2,000 years ago. He made ink using lead and some inks bought from Japan, and had high school students transcribe Bible verses, lines from Star Wars, and lines from the 1950s TV show, The Outer Limits. They then carbonized the scroll in a high-temperature oven, simulating the volcanic pyroclastic process. It was then scanned with an imaging technique used to unroll lithium ion batteries. And the scrolls were readable.
This represents a partial solution to the Herculaneum repository. Lots of the scrolls were written with a carbon-based ink, which is difficult to sort out from the carbonization that happened when the volcanic effects transformed them into briquettes. But they've established that a number of the scrolls were written using high-metal content inks, so this new process should be viable on an unknown number of scrolls. Researchers can use a handheld X-ray fluorescence scanner to qualify which scrolls are candidates for this different technique to minimize handling of the repository.
It will be very interesting to see what results from this.
https://arstechnica.com/science/2026/09/why-researchers-made-their-own-model-herculaneum-scrolls/
Related to the above, this is a 46-page PDF titled "Complete virtual unwrapping and reading of a rolled Herculaneum papyrus". While it is highly technical, it includes photographs of what the carbonized scroll looks like, and not only what the results of the scan look like when it's been reconstructed with software, but the actual translation of it! For me, there's an awful lot of info to geek out over in here, but I freely admit most of it was well over my head.
Still, the reconstruction photos are incredibly awesome!
https://arxiv.org/pdf/2606.29085
But they weren't scrolls per se, they were essentially charcoal briquettes. The eruptions' pyroclastic blast and flow had flashed them from papyrus to charcoal in an instant, rendering them too fragile to touch, much less to consider unrolling. The merest touch would cause them to disintegrate.
The Vesuvius Challenge was started as an attempt to make radical new approaches with modern non-invasive scanning technology to 'unroll' these briquettes electronically using CTs, MRIs, whatever people could bring to bear along with software to make them readable.
A prize of $700,000 was awarded a few years ago for one such effort.
Well, progress has been on-going and another major advancement has been achieved.
A retired SETI engineer heard about the problem these researchers were having and got involved. Being involved in SETI, he was familiar with the problem of low signal-to-noise ratios: the scans got very little signal and an awful lot of noise, and had to try to improve the signal to get meaningful data. This was his field!
He started with buying modern papyrus from Egypt that was largely made using the same process used 2,000 years ago. He made ink using lead and some inks bought from Japan, and had high school students transcribe Bible verses, lines from Star Wars, and lines from the 1950s TV show, The Outer Limits. They then carbonized the scroll in a high-temperature oven, simulating the volcanic pyroclastic process. It was then scanned with an imaging technique used to unroll lithium ion batteries. And the scrolls were readable.
This represents a partial solution to the Herculaneum repository. Lots of the scrolls were written with a carbon-based ink, which is difficult to sort out from the carbonization that happened when the volcanic effects transformed them into briquettes. But they've established that a number of the scrolls were written using high-metal content inks, so this new process should be viable on an unknown number of scrolls. Researchers can use a handheld X-ray fluorescence scanner to qualify which scrolls are candidates for this different technique to minimize handling of the repository.
It will be very interesting to see what results from this.
https://arstechnica.com/science/2026/09/why-researchers-made-their-own-model-herculaneum-scrolls/
Related to the above, this is a 46-page PDF titled "Complete virtual unwrapping and reading of a rolled Herculaneum papyrus". While it is highly technical, it includes photographs of what the carbonized scroll looks like, and not only what the results of the scan look like when it's been reconstructed with software, but the actual translation of it! For me, there's an awful lot of info to geek out over in here, but I freely admit most of it was well over my head.
Still, the reconstruction photos are incredibly awesome!
https://arxiv.org/pdf/2606.29085
In yet another bit of insanity that has been stopped, at least for now...
There have been several outdated coal plants that were well beyond the end of their effective life that were to be shut down. And the Department of Energy issued orders for them to remain open at the last minute, costing the companies and tax base money, increasing area pollution, etc.
The DoE can do this in two cases. First, under a war emergency situation. Which we do not have. While we may be engaged in a conflict with Iran, we have no declaration of war, Trumpty-dumpty ordered a treacherous sneak attack with no Congressional approval. Treacherous because a State Department negotiating team was meeting with their Iranian counterparts discussing treaties. You DO NOT attack when people are meeting and discussing treaties. I believe the term is Perfidy. Second, only Congress has the power to declare war, and I don't believe that has happened.
Second, the DoE can order plants to remain open if there is a shortfall of power production in the grid. They have not been able to remotely prove that to the court's satisfaction.
The best thing about this ruling is it can be applied nation-wide to all of the plants that have been ordered to remain open. It was all a sop to force them to continue buying coal from the mining companies that helped put Our Beloved Leader (long may it rain) back into orifice. Gotta get them kickbacks/bribes flowing back to his supporters!
I think we can expect this to be bumped to the SCOTUS.
https://arstechnica.com/science/2026/09/court-rejects-governments-energy-emergency-that-kept-coal-plant-open
There have been several outdated coal plants that were well beyond the end of their effective life that were to be shut down. And the Department of Energy issued orders for them to remain open at the last minute, costing the companies and tax base money, increasing area pollution, etc.
The DoE can do this in two cases. First, under a war emergency situation. Which we do not have. While we may be engaged in a conflict with Iran, we have no declaration of war, Trumpty-dumpty ordered a treacherous sneak attack with no Congressional approval. Treacherous because a State Department negotiating team was meeting with their Iranian counterparts discussing treaties. You DO NOT attack when people are meeting and discussing treaties. I believe the term is Perfidy. Second, only Congress has the power to declare war, and I don't believe that has happened.
Second, the DoE can order plants to remain open if there is a shortfall of power production in the grid. They have not been able to remotely prove that to the court's satisfaction.
The best thing about this ruling is it can be applied nation-wide to all of the plants that have been ordered to remain open. It was all a sop to force them to continue buying coal from the mining companies that helped put Our Beloved Leader (long may it rain) back into orifice. Gotta get them kickbacks/bribes flowing back to his supporters!
I think we can expect this to be bumped to the SCOTUS.
https://arstechnica.com/science/2026/09/court-rejects-governments-energy-emergency-that-kept-coal-plant-open
Our "Beloved" Leader has dyed!
Sep. 6th, 2026 01:29 pmHis hair, what's left of it, is now a much darker brown than his normal blonde.
WTF? Does he think that this makes him look young and viril?
https://www.msn.com/en-in/news/other/trump-s-new-brown-hair-turns-heads-did-he-dye-his-hair/ar-AA2bDEs6
WTF? Does he think that this makes him look young and viril?
https://www.msn.com/en-in/news/other/trump-s-new-brown-hair-turns-heads-did-he-dye-his-hair/ar-AA2bDEs6
$16 for 9 books featuring four books of the Paksenarrian series about a young woman who wants to become a mercenary fighter and ends up a god-touched paladin, and five books in the Heris Serano series where a woman is drummed out of the Regular Space Service on trumped-up charges, takes command of a rich old lady's yacht - she's mainly interested in horses - and still has to save the universe.
I recently re-read the first three Paksenarrian books, it's an excellent series. It's been ages since I've read the Serano series but I remember quite enjoying it.
Elizabeth Moon is a former United States Marine and has won a Nebula Award, a Robert A. Heinlein Award, and has been nominated for both the Hugo and the Arthur C. Clarke Awards.
This Bundle's charity is Canine Companions, which "enhances the lives of people with disabilities by providing highly trained service dogs and ongoing support to ensure quality partnerships, all free of charge." It just started Saturday and runs for another twenty days.
All books are epubs with no DRM.
https://www.humblebundle.com/books/elizabeth-moon-paksenarrion-and-more-minibundle-baen-books-books
I recently re-read the first three Paksenarrian books, it's an excellent series. It's been ages since I've read the Serano series but I remember quite enjoying it.
Elizabeth Moon is a former United States Marine and has won a Nebula Award, a Robert A. Heinlein Award, and has been nominated for both the Hugo and the Arthur C. Clarke Awards.
This Bundle's charity is Canine Companions, which "enhances the lives of people with disabilities by providing highly trained service dogs and ongoing support to ensure quality partnerships, all free of charge." It just started Saturday and runs for another twenty days.
All books are epubs with no DRM.
https://www.humblebundle.com/books/elizabeth-moon-paksenarrion-and-more-minibundle-baen-books-books
This is funny! It's only about a 5 minute video. And, IMHO, a very appropriate thing to do to him.
*SMH*
You can have a little display that shows you speed, navigation instructions, and remaining battery charge, on a very base model Ioniq for an additional $255. EVERYTHING else is on a monster big touchscreen on the middle of the dash. On another car, the driver display is an additional $5,000. It will be interesting to see how the distracted driving crash rate statistics go up.
What I want is a configurable digital display. Obviously a standard and mandatory requirement would be speed, gear selection, fuel level, turn indicators sort of thing. I also want oil pressure and water temperature.
The Motor1 article shows the car with and without the optional little mini display.
https://www.caranddriver.com/news/a73583741/hyundai-instrument-cluster-paid-option/
https://www.motor1.com/news/806676/hyundai-optional-instrument-cluster/?_cl=3hp6Ltk0mR4mtQwUWbG0u4lz
https://tech.slashdot.org/story/26/09/02/2246257/instrument-clusters-are-now-paid-extras-in-two-hyundai-models
You can have a little display that shows you speed, navigation instructions, and remaining battery charge, on a very base model Ioniq for an additional $255. EVERYTHING else is on a monster big touchscreen on the middle of the dash. On another car, the driver display is an additional $5,000. It will be interesting to see how the distracted driving crash rate statistics go up.
What I want is a configurable digital display. Obviously a standard and mandatory requirement would be speed, gear selection, fuel level, turn indicators sort of thing. I also want oil pressure and water temperature.
The Motor1 article shows the car with and without the optional little mini display.
https://www.caranddriver.com/news/a73583741/hyundai-instrument-cluster-paid-option/
https://www.motor1.com/news/806676/hyundai-optional-instrument-cluster/?_cl=3hp6Ltk0mR4mtQwUWbG0u4lz
https://tech.slashdot.org/story/26/09/02/2246257/instrument-clusters-are-now-paid-extras-in-two-hyundai-models
CJ Cherryh won her first Hugo Award FOUR YEARS after selling her first manuscript! She's considered a treasure among many science fiction/fantasy fans and is frequently recommended.
This Bundle is entirely epub, and includes Hugo-winning Downbelow Station, The Complete Morgain collection, what appears to be the complete Chanur collection (I personally recommend this), apparently the Foreigner series, and I don't know what else as I'm not deeply familiar with her work. I bought it all regardless, as less than $0.50 a book is too good a deal for this author.
While CJ is still with us, she announced her retirement from writing this year due to mental disability. Repeated exposure to anesthetics has made it extremely difficult to write and control narrative to the standard that she desires.
This Bundle's charity is BINC, the Book Industry Charitable Foundation, helping out small book and comic shops and their employees in hardship.
If you live outside of North America, you probably need to use a VPN to appear to be inside the USA to purchase this.
The Bundle:
https://www.humblebundle.com/books/best-cj-cherryh-daw-books-books
Cherryh's retirement announcement:
https://www.fandompulse.com/p/sci-fi-writer-cj-cherryh-announces
This Bundle is entirely epub, and includes Hugo-winning Downbelow Station, The Complete Morgain collection, what appears to be the complete Chanur collection (I personally recommend this), apparently the Foreigner series, and I don't know what else as I'm not deeply familiar with her work. I bought it all regardless, as less than $0.50 a book is too good a deal for this author.
While CJ is still with us, she announced her retirement from writing this year due to mental disability. Repeated exposure to anesthetics has made it extremely difficult to write and control narrative to the standard that she desires.
This Bundle's charity is BINC, the Book Industry Charitable Foundation, helping out small book and comic shops and their employees in hardship.
If you live outside of North America, you probably need to use a VPN to appear to be inside the USA to purchase this.
The Bundle:
https://www.humblebundle.com/books/best-cj-cherryh-daw-books-books
Cherryh's retirement announcement:
https://www.fandompulse.com/p/sci-fi-writer-cj-cherryh-announces
This year's awards ceremony will be conducted in Zurich, Switzerland for the first time due to safety concerns of participants traveling to the USA. This will continue for the foreseeable future.
A part of the ceremony includes the 24/7 lecture: winners must explain their science in 24 seconds, followed by summing it up in 7 words.
Some of the winning entries that caught my attention were: cockroach milk has three times the proteins of cow milk, and a Japanese scientist who won for a study called called “How to Blow the Nose—An Aerodynamic Study of the Nose Blowing”: sadly the scientist passed away before earning the award, and the use of mosquito proboscises as high-resolution 3D printing nozzles, a process called “Necroprinting.” They built a “3D necroprinter.” The necroprinter achieved a resolution ranging from 18 to 22 microns, which was two times smaller than the printers using the smallest commercially available metal dispensing tips. In the future, printers like this could be used to print scaffolds for living cells or microscopic electronic components. The idea is to replace expensive, traditional 3D printing nozzles with more affordable organic counterparts."
This necroprinter sounds quite awesome! This could truly be a life-saver for dermal use. When my mom passed away, she was an organ donor. She was, pretty much life-long, quite a fastidious user of hand lotion, and she was used as a skin donor! I have no idea how much tissue they were able to use, but I'm glad they were able to.
The award ceremony will travel around Europe in odd-numbered years - next year will be in Antwerp - returning to Zurich in even-numbered years. I believe the awards will be streamed, but the date was not included.
The Ig Nobels were started 35 years ago by the Journal of Improbable Research.
https://arstechnica.com/science/2026/09/meet-the-2026-ig-nobel-prize-winners/
A part of the ceremony includes the 24/7 lecture: winners must explain their science in 24 seconds, followed by summing it up in 7 words.
Some of the winning entries that caught my attention were: cockroach milk has three times the proteins of cow milk, and a Japanese scientist who won for a study called called “How to Blow the Nose—An Aerodynamic Study of the Nose Blowing”: sadly the scientist passed away before earning the award, and the use of mosquito proboscises as high-resolution 3D printing nozzles, a process called “Necroprinting.” They built a “3D necroprinter.” The necroprinter achieved a resolution ranging from 18 to 22 microns, which was two times smaller than the printers using the smallest commercially available metal dispensing tips. In the future, printers like this could be used to print scaffolds for living cells or microscopic electronic components. The idea is to replace expensive, traditional 3D printing nozzles with more affordable organic counterparts."
This necroprinter sounds quite awesome! This could truly be a life-saver for dermal use. When my mom passed away, she was an organ donor. She was, pretty much life-long, quite a fastidious user of hand lotion, and she was used as a skin donor! I have no idea how much tissue they were able to use, but I'm glad they were able to.
The award ceremony will travel around Europe in odd-numbered years - next year will be in Antwerp - returning to Zurich in even-numbered years. I believe the awards will be streamed, but the date was not included.
The Ig Nobels were started 35 years ago by the Journal of Improbable Research.
https://arstechnica.com/science/2026/09/meet-the-2026-ig-nobel-prize-winners/
Is he trying to court the anti-data center vote? That's about all that I can figure. It would absolutely knee-cap all data center construction and send AI investments tumbling.
I really don't need more examples to illustrate that the man has absolutely no idea what he's doing, yet he continues spewing them forth like a teenager being paid to hand out store closing flyers on a street corner.
Somehow the belief is that this will spur chip fabrication production, as there is a carve-out that the more money you spend on creating more chip factories, the lower your tariff will be. It takes a long time to make a chip fab, and we don't make the machines that make the machines that make the chips. All of this is a very slow process, and no amount of money can make that pipeline flow any faster.
Are we tired of winning yet?
https://gizmodo.com/president-trumps-love-of-tariffs-comes-into-conflict-with-his-love-of-data-centers-2000803876
I really don't need more examples to illustrate that the man has absolutely no idea what he's doing, yet he continues spewing them forth like a teenager being paid to hand out store closing flyers on a street corner.
Somehow the belief is that this will spur chip fabrication production, as there is a carve-out that the more money you spend on creating more chip factories, the lower your tariff will be. It takes a long time to make a chip fab, and we don't make the machines that make the machines that make the chips. All of this is a very slow process, and no amount of money can make that pipeline flow any faster.
Are we tired of winning yet?
https://gizmodo.com/president-trumps-love-of-tariffs-comes-into-conflict-with-his-love-of-data-centers-2000803876
RIP: Tim Curry, 80!
Aug. 26th, 2026 10:33 amARGH!
This is very breaking news. Tim suffered a stroke a few years ago and had been in poor health, so this is not terribly surprising. Obviously he is best known as Frankenfurter in The Rocky Horror Picture Show, he was also quite good in Clue and any number of other shows.
He will be missed.
https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/other/tim-curry-star-of-rocky-horror-picture-show-and-clue-dead-at-80/ar-AA2aZ3Yl
This is very breaking news. Tim suffered a stroke a few years ago and had been in poor health, so this is not terribly surprising. Obviously he is best known as Frankenfurter in The Rocky Horror Picture Show, he was also quite good in Clue and any number of other shows.
He will be missed.
https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/other/tim-curry-star-of-rocky-horror-picture-show-and-clue-dead-at-80/ar-AA2aZ3Yl
In 2016, Larry King asked Dolly Parton about her support for the LGBTQ+ community.
“If you’re gay, you’re gay. If you’re straight, you’re straight. We are who we are. I don’t believe that we should criticize and judge other people. I think we should be accepting and loving. We are all God’s children.
“If you’re the fine Christian you think you are, why are you judging people? That’s God’s job. We’re not God. We’re not judges. We’re supposed to love one another. We’re not supposed to judge, and we’re not supposed to take vengeance on other people. That’s God’s job.
“You should be allowed to be how you are and who you are.”
GO DOLLY! I have/had had lots of friends along that spectrum, my sister had three girls: one is gay and the other is now a very handsome lad. When the gay girl announced she was marrying her then girlfriend, my dad announced he would not attend the wedding. Russet and I said we would be there, and my mom asked if we would take her. Of course we would!
And my brother, the sympathetic Christian that he was, said he'd like to punch her in the face because if she wanted to be a man in a relationship, she should be able to take a punch. I never knew what he opinion was of the trans nephew.
“If you’re gay, you’re gay. If you’re straight, you’re straight. We are who we are. I don’t believe that we should criticize and judge other people. I think we should be accepting and loving. We are all God’s children.
“If you’re the fine Christian you think you are, why are you judging people? That’s God’s job. We’re not God. We’re not judges. We’re supposed to love one another. We’re not supposed to judge, and we’re not supposed to take vengeance on other people. That’s God’s job.
“You should be allowed to be how you are and who you are.”
GO DOLLY! I have/had had lots of friends along that spectrum, my sister had three girls: one is gay and the other is now a very handsome lad. When the gay girl announced she was marrying her then girlfriend, my dad announced he would not attend the wedding. Russet and I said we would be there, and my mom asked if we would take her. Of course we would!
And my brother, the sympathetic Christian that he was, said he'd like to punch her in the face because if she wanted to be a man in a relationship, she should be able to take a punch. I never knew what he opinion was of the trans nephew.
RIP: Dolly Parton, 80
Aug. 25th, 2026 09:07 pmA true Queen of Country, she was taken after a brief battle with cancer. Type of said cancer was unrevealed in the article that I read.
There's just too much of her story to go into. She was star of the recording studio, stage, movies, etcetera. Saturday Night Live appearances, The Porter Wagoner Show, the Grand Ol' Opry, there's just too much.
But there's one thing that has made a huge difference in this country: The Imagination Library. She started it up 31 years ago. To quote the web site: "Dolly Parton’s Imagination Library is dedicated to inspiring a love of reading by gifting books free of charge to children from birth to age five, through funding shared by Dolly Parton and local community partners in the United States, Canada, United Kingdom, Australia and Republic of Ireland.
Inspired by her father’s inability to read and write Dolly started her Imagination Library in 1995 for the children within her home county. Today, her program spans five countries and gifts millions of free books each month to children around the world.
“When I was growing up in the hills of East Tennessee, I knew my dreams would come true. I know there are children in your community with their own dreams. They dream of becoming a doctor or an inventor or a minister. Who knows, maybe there is a little girl whose dream is to be a writer and singer.
The seeds of these dreams are often found in books and the seeds you help plant in your community can grow across the world.”
She will be remembered for a tremendous number of things. I hope the kids today and tomorrow who haven't been directly exposed to her music and other media learn of her through her Imagination Library.
https://apnews.com/article/dolly-parton-death-country-icon-87156f3e6a1547b88bf414529b644ad3
https://imaginationlibrary.com/
There's just too much of her story to go into. She was star of the recording studio, stage, movies, etcetera. Saturday Night Live appearances, The Porter Wagoner Show, the Grand Ol' Opry, there's just too much.
But there's one thing that has made a huge difference in this country: The Imagination Library. She started it up 31 years ago. To quote the web site: "Dolly Parton’s Imagination Library is dedicated to inspiring a love of reading by gifting books free of charge to children from birth to age five, through funding shared by Dolly Parton and local community partners in the United States, Canada, United Kingdom, Australia and Republic of Ireland.
Inspired by her father’s inability to read and write Dolly started her Imagination Library in 1995 for the children within her home county. Today, her program spans five countries and gifts millions of free books each month to children around the world.
“When I was growing up in the hills of East Tennessee, I knew my dreams would come true. I know there are children in your community with their own dreams. They dream of becoming a doctor or an inventor or a minister. Who knows, maybe there is a little girl whose dream is to be a writer and singer.
The seeds of these dreams are often found in books and the seeds you help plant in your community can grow across the world.”
She will be remembered for a tremendous number of things. I hope the kids today and tomorrow who haven't been directly exposed to her music and other media learn of her through her Imagination Library.
https://apnews.com/article/dolly-parton-death-country-icon-87156f3e6a1547b88bf414529b644ad3
https://imaginationlibrary.com/
