The World The US had their midterms last Tuesday, and as expected it was a blowout in favor of the Democrats, though I think everything went far better than anyone thought. I was kind of looking forward to seeing if Trump would do anything dumb in response but he seemed kind of restrained about it, claiming he "wasn't on the ballot" and that's why they lost. The margins were so wide there was no way he could claim cheating! There is an air of cautious optimism among the USians I follow which is…

Why are the kids always outside? They know there’s dinosaurs that only eat kids out there.

Quoted Two Decades in the Swamp by Ilya Shapiro (City Journal) Public-health guidance shifted so often it needed its own RSS feed. On March 5, 2026, City Journal published an entertaining and thoughtful essay by Ilya Shapiro titled Two Decades in the Swamp. I recommend the essay as a general matter, but here we will focus on just one small part of it. Mr. Shapiro, while discussing public health guidance in the early stages of a certain incident from 2020: Public-health guidance shifted so often…

Are you the sort of person who a) sets annual reading goals and b) becomes anxious about hitting those goals sometime in November? And are you willing to take shortcuts? If so, the Help Finish Your Reading Goals book bundle is for you! Ten pieces of short fiction (individually packaged so they each can count as a book read). It’s $15, running from November 7 – November 29. My short tale of fae bargains and disordered eating, “Like Gold Upon Her Tongue,” is one of the books. Cover photo: Samuel…

It’s been a couple of Sundays, and the “picdump” is back! After three weeks on vacation in Japan and the Philippines, The Adventures of Accordion Guy in the 21st Century is back with the weekly collection of memes, pictures, and cartoons floating around the internet that I found interesting or relevant this week. Share and enjoy! Screenshot Screenshot Screenshot Screenshot Screenshot Screenshot Screenshot Screenshot Screenshot Screenshot Screenshot Screenshot Screenshot Screenshot Screenshot…

Every year, I read accounts of people’s trips to VCF East and West (Vintage Computer Federation), and think: I’ve got to find a way to get to one of these events. When VCF Montréal 2026 2.0 was announced, I decided to go - its so much easier for me to get to than VCF East/New Jersey. I’m on my way back to Toronto by train and writing my thoughts while it is still fresh!

Migrate - Phase 1 Working through some of my local projects, one of them has been a bit of a longstanding one. I've had this site hosted on a Linode VPS since I restarted it, but it was also fronted by the CDN that I work for. I figured it was free for me to use, and it makes for a great place to have a demo or lab setup that I can quickly use to test configuration changes out. Only, I want this to be my place, not a place where I can sometimes break it because I'm doing stuff at work. So it's…

There are many ways to interpret the question "Does money buy happiness", in my humble opinion. Will I be happier if I have more money? My answer is yes. Will I be not unhappy if I have more money? My answer is no. And that's just two interpretations. I'm sure there are tons more way to answer. ~ Link: Does Money Buy Happiness?, by Tuesday's Child

I had moved back from Huntsville to my parents' trailer in Burleson County. The cost of staying on campus was too high now that the economy was going belly up and so I had made the cost-saving suggestion I stay at home until my dad was working again. The cost of me commuting the 90-minute drive from my university to my parents' place was significantly lower than the cost of any kind of housing situation in Huntsville. It was June of 2009 - a detail I remember because the new Fallout 3 DLC -…

Late Night Pizza – New York, New York This $1.50 pizzeria is near where I stayed, and I’ve eaten there several times. Not as a full meal, but as a quick snack. And it really did cost $1.50, including the tax. New York City is certainly expensive, but I found some genuine food bargains in Manhattan. This inexpensive pizza, in plain cheese, might be slightly smaller than a regular slice, but it’s satisfying. It actually tasted quite good. Not the best, but it was certainly worth more than they…

So, I've always been somewhat annoyed at SSL/TLS. It requires everyone to go through a complex "ACME" dance just to put up a public website. Worse, certificates expire every few months, so it's not a one and done thing: even with automation, maintaining a certificate requires care to ensure the ACME client always has access to DNS records or the web server. ... and the whole system doesn't even work because certificates are issued over plaintext connections, and trusted certificate aurthorities…

Democrats should finally pass a law that bans members of Congress from trading individual stocks. It’s extremely popular, directly addresses corruption, and the President would probably sign it — he doesn’t care if members of Congress are allowed to trade stocks.

Source: Pexels New York City can drain your budget fast if you move through it without a plan. One subway swipe turns into three, a quick snack becomes a $20 lunch, and suddenly your “casual day out” feels expensive. You don’t need a luxury budget to get the full NYC experience, though. If you want […] The post How to Build a New York City Day That Feels Big Without Spending Big first appeared on Correr Es Mi Destino.

Another great “birthday show” from Tina Schlieske at the Dakota. Highlight of the show was her performance of “Man’s World”. Incredible.

The Great British Baking Show confused me again with "Free-From Party Week," which just turned out to be party-themed bakes without things like dairy, gluten, or animal corpses. How did that go in the tent?

Last year I posted the list of my default apps. It’s time to update it for 2026! New apps are bolded and app I don’t use anymore are struck out. This post was originally published on abhinavsarkar.net. This post is a part of the series: Apps I Use. Apps I Use (2023) Apps I Use (2024) Apps I Use (2025) Apps I Use (2026) 👈 Email: GMail Notes: Apple Notes, Bear Weather: Apple weather, Pixel weather Map: Google Maps To-do: Google Tasks Activity tracker: Garmin Connect, Strava Photo shooting: Stock…

Subscribe and Listen: https://youtu.be/nsIcKTfW7Qw🎙️ Regulatory ResetThe political spectrum for technology policy may have changed week with the US midterm elections. The prior mandate around the underlying infrastructure layer of the AI boom might change too.All companies in the AI value chain tied to data centers may see renewed focused on regulation in the US market. Building out future AI data center capacity in the US might require more than exhuberance and assumed…

Miscellaneous bits of news and fun stuff from around the Internet... ...The annual November Barnes & Noble Criterion Collection half-price sale has begun! This year it runs through December 6th....Over at 50 Westerns From the 50s, Toby Roan reviewed the Warner Archive Blu-ray release of THE LAST HUNT (1956)...and at Trailers From Hell Glenn Erickson has reviewed the Warner Archive's new PLEASE DON'T EAT THE DAISIES (1960) Blu-ray disc....Thanks to James L. Neibaur for his review making me aware…

It may come as no surprise, but, I like cows. Cows are such sweet animals, and did you know that they have lifelong friends? And that if you befriend a cow, they'll always come looking for you? And that they love bananas? Well, now you do.

Mary Poppins, 2026.

My Heritage Fit Alpha Industries MA-1 JacketFragrance isn't my only love. I'm also passionate about MA-1 flight jackets. No, I don't own 250 of them, so my collection is nowhere near as ridiculous (I have a paltry 3), but I love and read about them just the same. There are countless Reddit threads on MA-1 jackets, and when I really want to go in-depth, I visit The Fedora Lounge. This is a widely

Breakfast, lunch, dinner, midnight, doesn’t matter. I can eat a crepe at any hour of day . The post Late Night Crepes appeared first on @Kevuhnn / 📸 / 📚 / 🇨🇦.

It is the mid-1960s – swinging, happening, mid-1960s Britain, except actually not really. You see, in the timeline we’re visiting World War II took a very different course when Hitler was ousted by a coup of career military officers, led by Rommel, in 1941. (In real life they didn’t act until 1941, by which point the war was well and truly lost anyway.) This didn’t stop the war, but it did change who was calling the shots. Two invasions of Britain were launched – one in 1942 which was driven…

Welcome to the weekly Perfume Chat Room, perfumistas! I envision this chat room as a weekly drop-in spot online, where readers may ask questions, suggest fragrances, tell others their SOTD, comment on new releases or old favorites, and respond to each other. The perennial theme is fragrance, but we can interpret that broadly. This is meant […]

An utterly predictable report from the field.A couple weeks ago, frustrated by the extent to which I was finding focus once again very hard to come by, I deleted a bunch of apps from my phone. This is — obviously — not a novel idea. Many people have done this dance. I report here simply that by deleting the following from my phone, my temptation to look often at it throughout the day has plummeted: Mail A feed reader1 Strava My temptation has not fallen to zero, of course. I can still log into…

White Gum Valley2026 November 8 (Sunday), 10:09AM· genealogy · Carnarvon · This is my grandmother in the 1930s in Carnarvon: ← Previous My main RSS news feed: https://samwilson.id.au/news.rss(or Wikimedia.rss, Fremantle.rss, OpenStreetMap.rss, etc. for topic feeds). Email me at sam@samwilson.id.au to leave a comment.

Revenant Gun and Maven Stratagemby Yoon Ha LeePublished By SolarisAuthor's Site A few years ago I reviewed Ninefox Gambit, a book I really enjoyed. It had everything I want in epic military scifi - spaceships, huge stations, massive battles, weird quasi-magical powers, and self-destructive fractional politics. You can read my full review here. Do the two followup books meet the same high standard? I finally got around to finding out. The Machineries of Empire cover sure have some cool art.…

this week involved working my muscle of disciplined communication and keeping calm under pressure, as i work on some special projects along with tackling a typo that my pharmacy made that lead to them not filling one of my prescriptions. it's not a major issue that a human made a mistake alone, but that technology spread the existence of wrong digit across so many portals - that i never asked to be added to - but it takes a phone call, email, talking to an ai chat bot, and in-person visit to…

I proposed a quick trip to the gallery to photograph a specific exhibit. Pictures I could hopefully use in a newsletter I produce for my local Zen group. ⌾ : Ricoh GR IV Monochrome.⚲ : Australian National Gallery, Canberra. Alas, the exhibit was closed for renovation. Dud. Narrator: little did he know there is no such thing as a dud visit to the Australian National Gallery. Wandering toward the exit, I discovered this whole set of new works that I had not seen before. This made the trip…