I can’t seem to get enough of these automated blog idea generators. I have written about them before. These sites can easily be google’d, and I am not sure if it matters who they are. They are pretty much the same, and if you are that desparate for blog ideas, you are welcome to take advantage of these. I don’t much care for them.
I entered: author, election, fraud, coffee, and keyboard to one blog topic engine that asked for 5 words.
The results, once again, were mildly amusing, and a constant reminder to follow my own creative muse rather than rely on a bot to tell me what to write:
Author: Expectations versus reality
Will election ever rule the world?
The next big thing in keyboard
Coffee explained in 140 characters
8 things your competitors don’t want you to know about fraud
Glass computer and keyboard; stylish model looks like he’s up to something.
About 15 years ago, I poked fun at the then-mini-trend of stylish models posing in front of transparent computer monitors, often with glass, see-through keyboards on glass desks. Back in the day, there was no such thing as see-through comptuer monitors, so these overly-stylized depictions could have been used to open up the topic of hacking in some vaguely lavish setting; or it could have just as easily been used to sell the clothes, hairstyles and makeup of the models depicted.
Stumbling on my old article on a random browse made me search again for more such depictions. Well, apparently, glass monitors appear to be closer to reality than they were in the past.
Maybe these go as far back as 2011. Let’s see…
Monitor on this laptop looks like it’s see-through all right… Clicking on this image leads to the original blog article.OK … so now you’re just fucking with me.
Turns out, the only trick here was to remove the laptop from the desk, take an image, then import it as their desktop, carefully lining up the monitor with the real background behind the laptop.
So, they are not necessarily made of glass, and are definitely not see-through. Got it.
A year later, in 2012, a person narrating on a YouTube channel called The Panin Group, claimed to have patented a glass which can pick up light rays and have a see-through effect in a more genuine way:
See-through-monitor still requires a rear projector, which would appear to leave the user staring into a light beam. Looks kind of OK, but no cigar yet.Oh, wait.
The image immediately above is from a website called the “OLED Store” (link is embedded in the image above, natch). Right now, they appear to be selling big versions of actual transparent monitors for office partitions and kiosks. This is apparently a recent phenomenon, with LG releasing its transparent OLED monitors for retail sale only since April of 2023. Transparent OLEDs are already being used on the windows of some subways in China and LRTs in Japan, enabling passengers to see computer images as well as look outside. In the United States, The Smithsonian Museum has been using a 55″ transparent OLED display for one of its exhibits since December of 2021.
A 55″ transparent OLED monitor by Planar currently retails on E-Bay for $16,000.00. But for that low price, you only get a used one. And yes, it is possible to get a similar QianZi knockoff monitor new for a mere $10,086 from Amazon. Both monitors only have 1080p (1K) resolution, and are not sold as TV or computer monitors; rather they are classified as signage. LG was supposed to have an actual television out this month, but the best I could find was from one Canadian retailer who is selling signage with an MSRP of $30,190. This is from a Waterloo, Ontario based company called PC-Canada. They are currently on sale there at a steal for $27,120. Get ’em while they’re hot!
The only use case I can imagine for the 55″ LG monitor is for some rich business tycoon to check his stock report while watching the seagulls fly by his window. This photo is from the LG website (clicking on the image gets you to the LG website). LG is currently selling these monitors as “signage”, meaning public signs with changing messaging, or kiosks.
In memoriam 2023. This is a list of well-known celebrities and public figures that have passed away this year, in reverse chronological order. You might take note of the unusually high number of people in this list who lived to age 100 or older.
December 27. Gaston Glock (b. 1929), age 94. Austrian engineer and founder of the company that makes Glock pistols.
December 26. Tommy Smothers (b. 1937), age 86. Part of the Smothers Brothers comedy duo, alongside brother Richard. Also known for playing Guitar with John Lennon during the Montreal bed-in for the song “Give Peace a Chance”.
Laura Lynch
Decenmber 22. Laura Lynch (b. 1958), age 65. One of the founding members of The Dixie Chicks.
December 16. Pete Lucas (b. 1950) age 73. Former singer and guitarist of the British group Dave Dee, Dozy, Beaky, Mick and Tich. Also played with The Troggs.
December 16. Colin Burgess (b. 1946) age 77. Original drummer for AC/DC.
December 15. Bob Johnson (b. 1944) age 79. Former guitarist, singer and songwriter for Steeleye Span.
December 14. Joseph Wilson (b. 1996) age 27. YouTuber known as “Mitten Squad” with 1.4 million viewers and subscribers.
Norman Lear
December 6. Norman Lear (b. 1922), age 101. Producer of All In the Family, and a host of other highly-rated sitcoms in the 70s and 80s. Spinoff series included The Jeffersons and Maude. Lear was also the founder of the organization “People for the American Way”. Other sitcoms included Sanford and Son, One Day at a Time, and Good Times.
December 5. Denny Lane (b. 1944), age 79. Former band member with the Moody Blues, and later, Wings.
Myles Goodwyn
December 3. Myles Goodwyn (b. 1948), age 75. Founding member and lead singer of April Wine. Also named to the Canadian Songwriters Hall of Fame. Readers of my blog might remember my chiding April Wine for their crappy album covers, inside which had real gems of rock music, which contributed to earning the band a place on the Candian Walk of Fame, as well as the Canadian Rock and Roll Hall of Fame.
December 3. Geordie Walker (b. 1958) age 64. One of the original guitarists of the post-punk band The Killing Joke.
Chad Allan
December 2. Chad Allan (b. 1943), age 80. Founding member and lead singer of The Guess Who. The Vancouver Sun has him as passing about a week earlier, but a Facebook post from Burton Cummings and a CBC report are in agreement with December 2.
December 1. Sandra Day-O’Connor (b. 1930), age 93. Former chancellor of the College of William and Mary; retired American Supreme Court justice – the first woman to have ever served in the Supreme Court.
November 30. Shane MacGowan (b. 1958) age 65. Former songwriter and frontman for The Pogues.
November 29. Henry Kissinger (b. 1923), age 100. Served in the US governmentt as Secretary of State; Chairman of the 9/11 Commission; and was also chancellor of the College of William and Mary just before Sandra Day O’Connor.
Rosalynn Carter
November 19. Rosalynn Carter (b. 1927), age 96. Former first lady to President Jimmy Carter; and before that first lady in Georgia when Jimmy Carter was governor there.
November 11. Peter Moore (b. 1956), age 67. Produced The TrinitySessions, an album by The Cowboy Junkies, a popular album known for its sparse production and shoestring budget.
October 28. Matthew Perry (b. 1969), age 54. Actor appearing on Friends, and earlier on Ally McBeal.
October 25. Elizabeth Gray (b. 1937), age 86. Producer for CBC Radio and TV, producing for Cross-Country Checkup, The Journal, This Country in the Morning, and Morningside. Also guest hosted for As It Happens, replacing Barbara Frum.
Carla Bley
October 17. Carla Bley (b. 1936) age 87. American Jazz musician best known for being part of the Free Jazz movement in the 1960s.
October 15. Suzanne Somers (b. 1947), age 76. Best known for her work as Chrissy Snow in the sitcom Three’s Company, but also played the hooker driving the Thunderbird in American Grafitti, who courted a naive Curt, played by a boyish Richard Dreyfuss.
Karthyayani Amma
October 10. Karthyayani Amma (b. 1922) age 101. Wikipedia refers to this native of India as a “mature student”, which is an understatement, having passed a literacy exam with top marks at age 96, five years before her death. She became a Commonwealth of Learning Goodwill Ambassador in 2019, and was awarded the Nari Shakti Puraskar award the following year, which is the highest civilian honor in India, when she was 98.
September 29. Diane Feinstein (b. 1933), age 90. American Senator, and before that, Mayor of San Francisco. She died while holding office as a Senator.
September 7. Peter C. Newman (b. 1929), age 94. Canadian journalist, editor and author. Wrote The Canadian Establishment in three volumes in 1975, which raised the bar on business reporting.
Gary Wright
September 4. Gary Wright (b. 1943), age 80. American musician, wrote, composed and sung 70s hits Dreamweaver and Love is Alive.
September 1. Jimmy Buffet (b. 1946), age 76. Was the ‘roguish bard of island escapism’ (NYT). Grand Poobah of the Parrot Heads. Sang of the woes of tropical pirates, smugglers, beach bums and barflies that otherwise only they would know. Also, owner and CEO of the Maragritaville chain of restaurants and resorts.
August 28. Samuel Wurzelbacher (b. 1974), age 49. Known as Joe the Plumber, who became an icon of the middle class by politicians like John McCain who used his name in televised debates in 2008 against Barack Obama. I have written about him before.
Bob Barker
August 26. Bob Barker (b. 1924), age 99. Host of The Price is Right, and for a time, Truth or Consequences. The Price is Right was the longest-running game show in television history.
August 18. James Buckley (b. 1923), age 100. U. S. Senator and son of William F. Buckley.
August 9. Robbie Robertson (b. 1943), age 80. Canadian solo artist and founding member of The Band.
July 31. Paul Reubens (b. 1953), age 70. Known as Pee Wee Herman.
Sinead O’Connor
July 26. Sinéad O’Connor (b. 1967), age 56. Famous Irish pop singer. But she wouldn’t be famous for singing Danny Boy.
July 25. Pat Carney (b. 1935), age 88. Was a Conservative MP under the Mulroney conservatives; later appointed to the Senate.
July 21. Tony Bennett (b. 1926), age 96. Successful singer and actor. Won 20 Grammies and has a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame.
Daniel Ellsberg
June 16. Daniel Ellsberg (b. 1931), age 92. Leaked the Pentagon Papers to the press, disclosing many American lies about Vietnam. He also was intricately involved in Watergate, since his psychiatrist’s office was being wiretapped.
June 12. Treat Williams (b. 1951), age 71. Played in scores of major films and television shows; winner of a Golden Globe.
June 8. Pat Robertson (b. 1930), age 93. Teleevangelist and one-time host of The 700 Club. Also held a job as chancellor of Regents University, whose campus is in Virginia.
Astrud Gilberto, looking straight ahead, not at the camera.
June 6. Astrud Gilberto (b. 1940), age 83. Brazilian vocalist, who sang the 1963 bossa nova hit The Girl From Ipanema, and is partly responsible for popularizing the bossa nova genre outside of Brazil. Made dozens of albums and compilations up until 2008, mostly all bossa nova.
May 24. Tina Turner (b. 1939), age 83. Had several hits since the 1960s with ex-husband Ike Turner. Hit her career peak as a soloist in the 1980s and later.
Gordon Lightfoot
May 1. Gordon Lightfoot (b. 1939), age 84. Canadian Music Hal l of Famer, as well as a Canadian Country Music Hall of Famer, winner of 16 Juno awards for his contribution to folk, rock and pop music genres.
April 27. Jerry Springer (b. 1944) age 79. Had his heyday during the ’90s “tabloid talk show” craze. Before that he was mayor of Cincinati for two years.
Harry Belafonte
April 25. Harry Belafonte (b. 1927), age 96. Had the first million selling album Calypso, on Billboard, and penned many chart-topping singles in the Calypso genre which crossed over into popular music. Had a high profile in the civil rights movement, having helped to get Rev. Martin Luther King out of Birmingham Prison. At age 32 he was the most highly paid black performer in the United States. I have written about him before. Here is another article.
April 25. Harry Potts (b. 1921), age 102. Oldest survivor of the sinking of the USS Arizona, which was part of the Japanese bombing of Pearl Harbour.
Al Jaffee, seen here holding the Eisner Award, also won a Reuben Award from the National Cartoonists Society.
April 10. Al Jaffee (b. 1921), age 102. Cartoonist for Mad Magazine in the 1970s and onward, and was known for the Mad Fold-In on the inside back cover of every issue of the magazine. Also known for his “Snappy Answers to Stupid Questions” comics which sporadically appeard in many issues. All of his work for Mad was freelance. Despite that, he was a regular contributor that helped set the style for Mad. Winner of the Reuben award in 2007, which put him up there with Charles Schulz, Matt Groening, Gary Larson, Scott Adams, Garry Trudeau, and other cartooning bigwigs. He was inducted into the Will Eisner Hall of Fame in 2013. The Eisner Awards are comic industry awards, comparable to the Academy Awards.
March 26. Paul Schmidt (b. 1986), age 37. Famous for being murdered in front of a Starbucks in Vancouver by Inderdeep Gosal, who chose to murder him rather than not vape in front of Paul’s toddler. Or was he famous because his bleeding to death from the neck after being stabbed was being filmed on cellphone by Alex Bodger, a clueless kid who uploaded it to TikTok for the lulz and didn’t call the police, choosing instead to stand there and watch him die? Not sure.
March 23. Tony Abbott (b. 1930), age 92. Former Canadian MP (Peel South, Lib.), holding several portfolios in Pierre Trudeau cabinet.
Jim Gordon
March 13. Jim Gordon (b. 1945), age 77. Drummer for Traffic and Derek and The Dominoes; wrote Layla; murdered his mother because “the voices told him to”. Was diagnosed with schizophrenia while in jail for murder. He died while still incarcerated, after 39 years in a California prison.
March 10. Jerrold Samuels (b. 1938), age 84. Famous for his 1966 one hit wonder They’re Coming to Take Me Away! Ha-Haaa!, which reached #3 on Billboard, under his pseudonym Napoleon XIV. He also wrote hits for other artists, including Sammy Davis Jr.
March 2. Wayne Shorter (b. 1933), age 89. Famous jazz saxophonist. Co-founder of the 1970s jazz-fusion band Weather Report. Before that, he played with the Miles Davis Quintet. Winner of 12 Grammy awards over his career.
Gordon Pinsent
February 25. Gordon Pinsent (b. 1930), age 92. Famous Canadian actor, playing in mostly Newfoundland-themed and Canadian-themed film, TV and theater. He was a recipient of The Order of Canada, as well as having been awarded several Genies, and Actra awards.
February 21. Paul Berg (b. 1927), age 96. Won the Nobel Prize for his work in genetic engineering. Invented the concept of “recombinant DNA”.
February 19. Richard Belzer (b. 1944), age 78. The recognizable face from Law and Order SVU was a former standup comic at an earlier time. He was the warm-up comedian for Saturday Night Live, between 1975 and 1980.
Raquel Welch,
February 15. Raquel Welch (b. 1940), age 82. A successful actress who became an interenational sex symbol in the 1970s and 1980s.
February 8. Burt Bacharach (b. 1928), age 94. One of the most influential popular musical composers of the 20th century. Composed, wrote lyrics and produced songs for Marty Robbins, Perry Como, Dusty Springfield, Tom Jones, B. J. Thomas, The Carpenters and Dionne Warwick, often in collaboration with Hal David.
Cindy Williams, alongside Ron Howard, in the 1973 film American Grafitti.
January 30. Cindy Williams (b. 1947), age 75. Played Shirley Feeney in the sitcom Laverne and Shirley. Earlier roles were in the series Room 222, and Love, American Style. She also appeared in the 1973 film American Grafitti as Laurie Henderson, the date of character Steve Bolander, played by Ron Howard. She had also played in scores of other film and TV roles before and since.
January 30. Bobby Hull (b. 1939), age 84. Ontario-born player for the Chicago Black Hawks in the NHL. He had set many points records in the 1960s and 1970s. Joined the WHA and played for the Winnipeg Jets in 1972. After he retired, he was made Officer of the Order of Canada in 1978.
David Crosby
January 19. David Crosby (b. 1941), age 81. Member of The Byrds, and then the group Crosby, Stills and Nash. And he, like many, protested Vietnam. He also had 8 solo albums during his life. He also appeared as a guest musician on the albums of many other artists such as Joni Mitchell, Jefferson Airplane, Jackson Browne, Dave Mason, Art Garfunkel, Elton John, Bob Dylan, and dozens of others.
Gina Lollobrigida, as she looked in 1956.
January 16. Gina Lollobrigida (actress) (b. 1927), age 95. Another international sex symbol with a high profile in Europe in the 1950s and 1960s, although she began her acting career working for Howard Hughes at RKO in America. She was later a photojournalist, and later, a politician. She has a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame.
January 12. Lisa Marie Presley (b. 1968), age 54. American singer and songwriter; most famous for being the only daughter of Elvis Presley, although she did produce two studio albums that reached the top 10 on Billboard in the States between 2003 and 2005.
January 10. Jeff Beck (b. 1944) age 78. In 1965, he Replaced Eric Clapton in The Yardbirds, joining Keith Reif, Chris Dreja, Paul Samwell-Smith, Jim McCarty and later Jimmy Page to help release the only hits The Yardbirds had during his 20-month stay. In 1971, formed the Jeff Beck Group which lasted about 2 years; and went mostly solo or had brief collaborations with other major artists in the years since. He has reiceved 8 Grammy awards.
The Lenovo ThinkVision M14 is a portable monitor, intended for use with a laptop. The only connector you can use is USB-C only; and for best results, you need to use the one supplied by the manufacturer. I have plenty of USB-C connectors, but I found with my Acer Spin 3, the monitor has trouble being recognized. Even with the supplied cord (which is just two male USB-C’s end-to-end), recognition of the monitor under Windows 10 can be very dicey.
It appears as though it obtains both its power and its signal through the same USB port, since it appears to have no internal battery; and while it always powers up when connected, getting it recognised by the OS is the problem. It appears to power up, then after a few seconds of black screen, goes into standby mode. I can disconnect and reconnect the USB cable to get it to cycle on in hopes that the OS will pick it up, and several minutes are often consumed in getting it to power on with the desktop in display, and then disconnecting again if it goes on standby. Very frusttrating when this happens.
The monitor actually has 2 USB ports, one on each side, and I wondered if I could make things easier if I use one of them for power. While it didn’t mind being hooked up to a 3-5V power source, it also didn’t improve its chances of being recognized by Windows, emphasizing the fact that it isn’t necesarily a power issue.
When it works, it works quite well, and renders graphics surprisingly well for something which appears to have such low power needs. The controls on the side of the base are very limited, but I seem to get along without them, since the monitor appears to “do the right thing” (when it finally connects to my laptop, that is).
Like all things portable, I often get a little paranoid about the breakability of this monitor lying in its felt casing (which came out of the box) in my backpack. I have had this one for a few months, and no signs of cracks yet. The monitor itself is quite rigid, but at $280 I wish that they could add more protection to their monitor, since I would find it hard to believe that consumers would just leave these at home. Otherwise, what’s the point?
It is a common sore point I also have with cell phones, laptops, tablets, and all manner of devices that have somewhat large glass screens with scant protection. The reason Apple and Samsung can charge upwards of $1100 for their cell phones with virtually no protection is because we let them. Who’s stopping them from ripping people off like that? Certainly not the customers lined up for several blocks outside an Apple Store whenever a new cell phone gets released. If the latest $1300 iPhone 14 Pro can’t survive a 6 foot drop, then why charge $1300 for something so delicate? Again, it is because we let them, and the world is teeming with people who have a wealth of cash but suffer from the worst kind of FOMO imaginable.
The ThinkVision is far from $1300, but it is still pricey for what it does, and should also be adequately protected. I wouldn’t mind paying slightly more if I know it is protected and will be around for a few years.
Family Values. In South Carolina, Serena Caldwell, age 56 and Ericka Jones, age 27, two day-care workers working for a day-care nursery called Kids Unlimited located in the small town of Prosperity, allegedly “encouraged and directed fourteen 3 and 4 year-olds to fight each other and allowing the violence to proceed without correction”, according to the Newberry County Sheriff’s Office. Jones and Caldwell are each charged with multiple counts of “contributing to the delinquency of a minor”. Both have had their employment terminated. There were no serious injuries among the children (13 Nov).
Medical News. A man is launching a medical malpractice lawsuit after doctors at the University of Washington Medical Centre appeared to be unable to find his appendix and removing part of his lower colon instead. The patient, George Piano, nearly died of sepsis due to a now-leaking lower colon caused by the mishap. Piano’s personal injury lawyer said “I have never heard of [a surgeon] who was unable to locate an appendix.” There were four additional surgeries and multiple hospitalizations needed to repair the original botched operation, and more are on the way to try to reverse the ileostomy and to reconstruct his abdominal wall, according to a spokesman from the University of Washingon. (2 Nov)
Bad Judgement. A man in his 20s, while in the South Korean city of Jinju attacked a shop clerk with short hair, concluding she must be a feminist. Police say he was drunk and had been diagnosed and treated for schizophrenia. (6 Nov)
Government in Action. The Canadian Department of Natural Resources had commissioned KPMG at the cost of nearly $670,000 so that their consultants could advise them on how to save money on consultants. Professional outsourcing generally has cost the government north of 15 billion dollars across the federal public service, and the current government has been seeking efforts to rein in costs. No other government department had hired consultants for this. (8 Nov)
Labour News 700 Obamacare and Medicare call centre workers across seven states who were contracted out to a firm called Maximus, have staged a strike, and are asking for, among other things, affordable health care. But also on the agenda was to be paid a living wage somewhat more than the $16 per hour they currently get (the federal minimum wage). They also want improvements in working conditions. Maximus currently has a $6.6 billion dollar contract over 9 years with the federal government. Maximus is the largest federal contractor concerned with call centres, and has been accused of union-busting. President Biden has called on Maximus to honor unions and to start providing improvements in working and living conditions for their employees. (10 Nov)
Advances in TechnologyA factory robot programmed to handle boxes of food in the province of South Gyeonsang, South Korea, mistook a man for a box of bell peppers, and crushed him to death. The man, who was aged 40, was grabbed by the robot, which then pushed him on to a conveyor belt, crushing his face and chest. He later died in hospital. The man was testing the robot for defects in its sensors. The robot is mostly mechanical, and does not use AI, and would not be sophisticated enough to distinguish a box from a human. (9 Nov)
AI In the News.Bad news for lonely hearts: Forever Voices, an AI alternative to those who have been spurned by a person in real life, has now gone dark on their real-life paramours. 28 year-old owner John Heirich Meyer, who has had a history of mental health problems, shut down the service after he had been arrested for arson to his own apartment in Austin, Texas. There is now a Forever Voices subreddit for the digitally jilted. (22 Oct)
Crime and the Law. ALPHV/BlackCat, a Russia-based criminal ransomware group tried to threaten the US-based company MeridianLink with ransomware attacks. But when MeridianLink refused to pay, ALPHV/BlackCat filed a complaint with the American Securities and Exchange Commision (SEC), citing the SEC rule breached by chapter and verse, specifically citing Meridian’s failure to disclose BlackCat’s security breach to its customers. This is the first threat of its kind, a departure from the usual denial-of service attacks we see normally from bad actors like these. (16 Nov, 17 Nov)
Queen of Rock and Roll, released 24 Nov 2023 on iTunes.
The musical female artist Anna Mae Bullock, known to her fans as Tina Turner (1939-2023) began her career singing soul and R&B with husband Ike Turner back in the 1960s. They divorced in 1978, and she had a major comeback in the 1980s. She had scored hits in the top-40 in every decade since the 1960s, and according to the Guiness Book of World Records, was the first to do so. 17 of those hits were since the 1980s, when she went solo. She has had many awards including a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame.
Queen of Rock and Roll is mostly a compilation of her own hits, released earlier today. It opens with the Led Zeppelin hit Whole Lotta Love, done to her own styling, remastered from 1994. There are many other covers, such as Robert Palmer’s Addicted to Love, Dan Hill’s Sometimes When We Touch, Marvin Gaye’s It Takes Two, John Fogerty’s Proud Mary, and The Trammps’ Disco Inferno. But most of the 55 tracks are either remastered hits or notable songs, on the equivalent of 3 CDs. I initially thought Queen of Rock and Roll was in answer to Dolly Parton’s similarly voluminous Rockstar released a few days ago, but without the need for so many covers. It appears that this CD collection is mostly Tina’s own material.
Dolly Parton – Rockstar – Dolly got inducted last year into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, and I can’t understand why. Her non-country hits were largely pop-oriented, and songs like “9 to 5” have crossed over into the pop charts, but it’s not rock. Now at age 77, she has produced this new album called Rockstar, consisting mostly of her singing covers often with the musician that composed and wrote the song. She teams up with lead singers from The Beatles (surviving members Starr and McCartney both show up), as well as the lead musicians from CCR, Heart, Aerosmith, Blondie, and solo artists like Joan Jett, Peter Frampton, Miley Cyrus, Elton John, and, well, generally a star-studded cast of musicians. I think it will sell multi-platinum because of the big-budget appearances of nearly every surviving rock musician that is about her age, showing up and performing with her. Just in time for Christmas shopping. At 2 hours and 21 minutes, its 31 tracks are a bit of a slog, and the equivalent of a triple LP if it comes out in that format. Not my cup of tea, though.
The marketing juggernaut that is Taylor Swift.
Anything recent by Taylor Swift — On iTunes “Top Pop Albums” collection, there are five albums by music billionaire Taylor Swift, and at least two of them have more than one version: Lover, 1989, Midnights, Red, reputation. Taylor Swift occupies 10 positions on the top 200 album list this week. This has been more or less verified on Billboard’s Hot 200 Albums. Apart from titles already mentioned is her 2020 album Folklore at #16; Evermore, another album from 2020 at #38; Speak Now, a revised version of a 2010 album at #41; and Fearless, an album from 2008 at #96. In case you are awake, and counted only 9 albums, 1989 appears twice: Once at #1 and once at #48. The version at the #1 position is a recent revised version. While much of these have gone multi-platinum, still not my cup of tea. She occupies about 16 positions on Billboard’s Hot 100 Singles.
I also noticed this by other artists: Drake has 8 albums on the top 200; Morgan Wallen has three; Billie Eilish and Rihanna have two each. 25 albums on Billboard this week are held by 5 artists. Dolly Parton has not charted yet with Rockstar, which was released only yesterday.
On Billboard, I noticed Fleetwood Mac’s 1976 album Rumors is at #40 on the top 200 albums this week. #1, the greatest hits comp by The Beatles released in 2000, now over 2 decades old, has just re-entered at #149. AC-DC’s Back in Black, an album that will soon be 44 years old, also re-entered at #160; Eagles’ Greatest Hits 1971-1975, an album our family had on 8-track, is now at #176; Abba’s 1992 Abba Gold Greatest Hits, is one below the Eagles at #177; Fleetwood Mac’s 1988 Greatest Hits is at #197; Bob Seger’s 1994 Greatest Hits is at #163. Oh, and I have to mention: at #195, Elv1s: 30 #1 Hits, a 2002 album of 60 and 70 year-old hits which peaked at #1.
Our musical favourites as a culture has become a rehash of old music that is older than most of the consumers buying the music. By sharp contrast, one of the craziest things I have noticed about all this new music record companies are putting out: it’s shit. People just want to buy the old stuff. Today’s music is so bad in fact, that when a half-decent performer like Taylor Swift comes out, she dominates the charts more than The Beatles ever did in their prime. It is not because of any merit of Taylor Swift (I say, at the risk of offending Taylor Swift fans); it is more because of the utter lack of competition from other capable artists. I don’t feel that today’s artists are less talented than they were during the 70s; it is just that companies are not investing in their talent like they used to. Recording companies will invest in the odd musician and invest in them more if they will toe the corporate line. Talent is not as much of a driving factor as it used to be.
Think you’re a homeowner? Meet your new landlords.
When I was referring to the Toronto Star report back in August, regarding interest rates causing indebtedness to outrun payments made by homeowners, little did I realize how much has been made of this in the major media, although it isn’t as front-and-center as one would expect. There is even a name for this endgame of indebtedness: negative amortization.
Negative amortization happens when you rack up a significant debt on your credit card, then decide to only pay the minimum payment that month. This payment is not usually enough to offset the interest that was added in the same month, so your minimum payment still results in your debt increasing.
Getting back to mortgages, if you take out a mortgage to purchase a property after a certain amount of money down, you eventually should be able to pay it off in 20 to 25 years. You normally pay mostly interest first, then at some point this flips over and you end up paying mostly principal.
But with negative amortization (called negam for short), the payment on the loan is less than the interest charged during the same period, causing interest – and as a reult your entire debt – to balloon over time, despite the fact that you are making regular payments.
Home ownership is something that most people look to as the largest investment they will ever make in their lives. Home owners who find their loans are now negatively amoritized face losing equity in their home, and the prospect of the banks effectively becoming their landlords, enslaving their customers in debt.
Investors often negotiate such a negam mortgage when they plan to sell later at a higher price. The strategy is to pay a low monthly payment ahead of the 5 year limit on speculation that the house will sell at a higher price. Of course, this is risky, as market downturns can turn projected profits into actual losses.
For average homeowners, negam can come in degrees. For example, due to interest rate hikes, the fixed payments can become almost all interest, with only less than $50 to pay off the principal. This causes the amortization period to possibly go from 25 years to 50 years. This has actually happened to some home owners, and is becoming increasingly common. Homeowners are now looking at the prospect of working well past when they planned to retire to service their mortgage. This is not exactly negam, because there will come a time when the interest will be paid off — but it is so far into the future as be considrered a form of rent where the landlord is not you, it is the bank.
A recent report by the Bank of Canada says that there is some $130 billion tied up in some form of negam loans, stretching out the payments to 35, 40, or as much as 75 years. 1 in 5 Canadian homeowners face these negam loans, and last month the OSFI put in place guidelines it has been proposing since last July to stem the growing tide of loans falling into negam territory. Banks themselves report that the number of loans with amoritization periods longer than 35 years range from 18% to 24% for their clients.
How did we get here? In my lifetime, the current prime interest rate I see from The Bank of Canada right now is 7%, which really isn’t that high. We have seen worse in the late 1970s and early 1980s (into the high teens), and negative amortization was still almost unheard-of. What is different these days, and what has some home owners panicking is the price of housing itself, which has ballooned several hundred percent since those decades to over a million dollars on average in the Greater Toronto Area.
Houses still sell for over 1 million dollars on average in the GTA, even after owners are reselling their homes at significant losses, losing as much as $400K in some cases, in part due to owners’ inability to afford their mortgages, and re-entering the rental market. And now the rental market has become saturated. Rents are increasing with increasing demands on fewer available apartments, as rentals have not been built on any significant scale in the GTA since around the late 1990s, favouring condominiums.
Just a few years ago, money was cheap, meaning that the interest rate for borrowing was 0.25% prime, as it had been for much of 2010, up to 2022. Customers were likely given the impression that this would last for the entire lifetime of their mortgage. And if they had to ride out high interest rates, no one was talking about 7% prime (which could retail at about 9% interest to the customer at the level of banks). No one was talking about their mortgage payments going from $2500 to over $4000 per month.
Currently there are over 100,000 customers in such a position (according to a report from CBC Television), and that is only counting CIBC. There are also four other major banks that are allowed to borrow at prime from the Bank of Canada, and it is likely that the real number of customers in that position is many times greater.
Innocent while black. In this recurring news topic, on October 18, CNN reports that a black Georgia man, Leonard Cure, who had been released from prison for a crime he didn’t commit, was returning home from visiting his mother, and was shot by a police deputy at a routine traffic stop, and later pronouced dead by medics. Cure was 56.
He actually has that much money? Self-proclaimed performance artist Alex Jones, host of the entertainment show Info Wars, was reminded that the 1.1 billion dollars he owes the families of the Sandy Hook victims was real, and not part of his performance. A Texas judge ruled that he can’t use Chapter 11 bankruptcy to avoid paying all or most of the money owed to the victim’s families that were named in the lawsuit. Jones also declared personal bankruptcy late in 2022. While his show is syndicated, he appears to make most of his money selling health products.
Mickey Mouse Parliament. A train carrying EU officials from Brussels and headed for Strasbourg, took a wrong turn and ended up about 12 km east of Paris, France, in Marne la Vallée Chessy, the location of a Disneyland resort. The officials on the train ride became known derisively as “Team Disneyland”. There was a 45 minute delay, before the train was re-routed. Mickey Mouse himself was unavailable for comment. (16 Oct)
Hallowe’en props. The half-naked body of 34 year-old Robert Owens was found on the lawn in front of an empty house in China Grove, North Carolina, after a groundskeeper had mowed grass around it, and who thought it was a Hallowe’en prop or a mannequin for K9 training, as the property had been previously used for dog training. His remains had been lying there for at least a day before a construction worker made the grim discovery and later Robert’s family identified his body. (17 Oct)
Bomb threat, but it depends. A Copa flight en route to Tampa, Florida from Panama City was routed back to Panama and evacuated of all of its passengers on the tarmack following a suspected bomb in one of the bathrooms. After the bomb squad was called in to inspect the landed and emptied plane, the “bomb” they suspected turned out to be an adult diaper. (13 Oct)
What became known as the Tet Offensive happened back in 1968 in North and South Vietnam, when on January 30, on the Vietnamese Lunar New Year (called Tết Nguyên Đán, or “Tet” by the Viet Cong), militants loyal to Ho Chi Minh launched surprise attacks throughout North and South Vietnam, co-ordinated to happen on the same day. The Tet Offensive was the greatest escalation of a war that since became unpopular by the American public, and triggered a drafting of another 200,000 US citizens to fight it. Mass anti-war protests in America and people burning their draft cards filled the news cycles in the years since the offensive. By the early 1970s, one of the last acts Nixon did before resigning, was to begin the complete withdrawal of troops, allowing the VietCong to rule in a now-united Vietnam (formerly North and South Vietnam), putting an end to what became the longest undeclared war in American history up to that time.
What struck many people was the fact that the Viet Cong were not nearly as militarily well-equipped as the Americans. The Americans had bombs, machine guns, napalm and Agent Orange, while the Viet Cong had much less firepower, and more bows and arrows, and other primitive devices.
Well, now here we are about 55 years later, where, on another part of the globe, where the Americans had helped Israel set up a secured border at a cost of over 1 billion dollars (monitored above and below ground around the clock), armed Israel to the hilt, providing it with advanced weaponry with training to match. But on October 7 of this year, Palestinian militants, who lack clean drinking water in their apartheid-style enclaves, easily crossed the billion-dollar border with hang gliders, motorcycles, tractors, speedboats and pickup trucks. And doing it all at once, they were able to launch its own version of a Tet Offensive. It even happened on a special day for the Middle East. It happened on the 50th anniversary of the Yom Kippur War, where the war was between Israel, Syria and Egypt.
The Palestinian attacks starting last week claimed the most civilian Jewish lives since the end of the Holocaust. These included young partygoers, families, hospital patients and hospital medical staff. There is no denying that the attack was brutal, indiscriminate, and calculated to terrorize the Israeli population. But they did hit military targets, and among the hostages were military personnel.
This comes at a time when the ultra-conservative Israeli head of state Benjamin Netanyahu is still facing protests from his own people regarding his disempowering of the Supreme Court. In his latest draft of 100,000 Israelis to fight Hamas, only some who quit over the Supreme Court issue, accepted the draft.
The Israelis have also bombed Palestinean hospitals and residences in Gaza, and ordered a total blockade, depriving Palestinians of “electricity, food, water and fuel”, according to Netanyahu. Over the course of this week, we hear about Israel dropping leaflets by air over the northern part of Gaza, saying to the over 1 million people there that they must evacuate to the southern part of Gaza within 24 hours. This amounts to a forceable exodus of a population, which is a war crime against the Palestinians. Over the past few days, grass-roots protests in support of Palestine were seen world-wide, while support for Israel had its own demonstrators, and were supported by most politicians, especially conservative politicians.
The latest news from the Scientologico-Illuminato-Skull-and-Boneso-Bohemian-Grovio Military industrial complex
The Queen of Canada is in it with Q-Anon. Romana Didulo, who calls herself the “Queen of Canada and leader of First Nations”, is the leader of a fringe Q-Anon group, spreading anti-vax conspiracies, and have uttered threats against health care workers and firefighters. They showed up in a fleet of 8 vehicles including a touring bus, to the town of Kamsack, Saskatchewan, a town of less than 2000 people living near the Manitoba border, and 56 km northeast of Yorkton. By 18 September of 2023, 200 residents – a “conspiracy” of townsfolk and members of the Cote First Nation – drove them out of town, nonviolently.
Richmound is near the Alberta border, about 80km northeast of Medicine Hat, and about 450 km west of Regina.
They later showed up near the Alberta border in the village of Richmound (population 118, but on the west side of Saskatchewan), have occupied an abandoned school there, and now the townsfolk there are attempting to drive out her and her entourage after villagers began receiving threats of public execution. She has a reputation for stoking protests but abandoning her supporters, most of them poor and destitute, if the protestors get arrested or instigate violence. The RCMP has been investigating.
News of her escapades have been broadcast on CBC, CTV, CTV again, and has now gone international, being mentioned on BBC and The UK Guardian. According to the Guardian, Didulo immigrated to Canada from the Philippines as an orphan at age 15 (she spends a lot of space on her bio discussing losing both parents at age 11), according to her website, canada1stparty.ca. Much of her website, when it isn’t railing against “globalists” and “communists” (two of Q-Anon’s pet topics), appeared to be filler text such as Lorem Ipsum, as well as a promotion for her engineering consulting firm. The candidates section had no names or photos of any candidates. The one photo that was visible appeared to be a stock photo from Getty Images. The website has since been taken down.
The New York City Top Brass are in it with the Freemasons. Eric Adams, Mayor of New York City, joined police commissioner Edward Caban, and Chief of Police Jeffrey Maddrey to become Freemasons this past weekend, as the city was recovering from prolonged rain leading to flash floods, affecting everything from roads, homes and businesses, to the subway system. Each of them received the highest honor in Freemasonry, that of “Master Mason”. This feeds into the conspiracy theory that Freemasons control the legal systems of many countries.
The Canadian Speaker of the House is in it with the Nazis.Speaker of the house Anthony Rota was forced to quit his job as speaker after apologizing for inviting to the parliamentary gallery, Yaroslav Hunka, a 98 year-old Ukranian veteran who fought for the Nazi Waffen SS in the Second World War, and introducing him to members of parliament to rounds of applause. While praising Rota for apologizing and stepping down, condemnation came from Jewish organizations such as the Simon Wiesenthal Center and B’nai Brith. (26 Sep)
In the Montrose neighbourhood of Houston, Texas, an electronic road sign was “hijacked” to read: “Due to Weather Go Fuck Yourself”. The road sign does not belong to Houston Public Works, and the owner has not been found. It has since been turned off by a city inspector. (11 Sep)
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AI In the News. This week, former NBA player for the Orlando Magic, Brandon Hunter, died at age 42 on September 12 following a collapse during a fitness class. MSN used an AI bot to write his obituary, stating “Brandon Hunter useless at 42” in the headline. The rest of the article was even more unintelligible, referring to him as an NBA “participant”, and that he was “handed away” at the age of 42. The bot “reports” that in high school he “acheived vital success as a ahead (sic) of the Bobcats” school team. He also apparently performed in “67 video games” over two seasons. The article was deleted the next day after MSN received complaints. All of these AI problems come on the heels of MSN firing much of its staff of human journalists this past December, to replace them with AI bots. (Sep 14) This is a recurring topic.
Kicking out the ladder from underneath you. American billionaire tycoon and kid at the debating table vying for running mate to Donald Trump, Vivek Ramaswamy, has promised to “gut” the H-1B visa program, dismissing it as a form of “indentured servitude that only benefits the company”. This is after he, himself the child of immigrants, has used that same program 29 times to hire immigrants to enrich his own pharmaceutical company. He has been previously criticized for his restrictionist immigration views. (Sep 16)
Names for your baby. Australian journalist Kirsten Drysdale recently gave birth to a young boy, and named him “Methamphetamine Rules”. It was either that or “Nangs Rule”, she said to reporters. This was part of a stunt to test the naming regulations of the Department of Births, Deaths and Marriages in her home province of New South Wales for an article on legal baby names which was aired by the Australian Broadcasting Company on September 20. The stunt backfired, since the name was actually approved, and she is now petitioning to have her son’s name changed into something more normal. It appears as if the approval of the name was in error, saying that it “slipped through”, and is considered to be a “highly unusual event” that it was approved. Unfortunately, her son’s birth record will now permanently have his first-assigned name, as well as any subsequent name change. (19 Sep)
Wanting to get in on a good thing. After a successful legal battle which resulted in the overpaid Board of Directors of Tesla having to return $700 million in excess compensation to shareholders, the winning lawyers now want $10,ooo per hour in return for their legal services, for a total of $229 million in legal fees, which if appproved, would be the largest legal payout ever in a shareholder lawsuit. There will be a hearing in Deleware set in October to approve this new settlement. Corporate star attorneys typically request a maximum of $2000 per hour, by way of contrast. (21 Sep)
Fight for your right to eviction party. In Berkeley, California, the Property Owners Association (BPOA) there threw a cocktail party at Freehouse Bar, next to Berkeley university campus, in celibration of the end of the eviction moratorium in honor of landlords in the area. It drew protestors, which then resulted in fisticuffs on both sides. Protestors left the venue shortly after the fights broke out. The BPOA says that there were many that could have paid rent but chose not to during the moratorium. But if that were true, that would be fraudulent, and there were few or no convictions of tenants due to fraud to anyone’s knowledge. Berkeley and the surrounding San Francisco Bay area have suffered from high rents and property values for some decades. (13 Sep)
Fined and jailed for eating redneck food. Indonesian food influencer Lina Lutfiawati had garnered thousands of followers on Tik Tok, showcasing food of many kinds from many cultures. But her most recent consuming of pork rinds on video was too much for the Indonesian Muslim clerics, and she was arrested. Touching pigs is taboo in Indonesian Muslim culture, and is in violation of blasphemy laws. Muslims make up almost 90% of the Indonesian population. (21 Sep)
Boebert steals the show, gets bad reviews.
NSFW. Has sexual content.
Republican congressperson Lauren Boebert, previously known for her verbal catfight in a ladies’ room with her fellow flaky colleague Marjorie Taylor-Greene, among other notable congressional lunacy, has recently been ejected from a theatre showing of the musical Beetlejuice in Denver with her date, a 46 year-old bar owner named Quinn Gallagher – 10 years her senior, for vaping, singing, using her phone to record the show, and mutual masturbation (over the clothes), all caught on surveillance camera, which also showed complaining nearby patrons. Their ejection from the theatre by threat of police being called was accompanied by such hubristic parlance as “Do you know who I am?” and “I’m going to contact the mayor!” Her most recent apology regarding this incident was for her “maybe overtly animated” behaviour at the theatre that day. Political pundit and occasional drama critic Ann Coulter gave the Boebert performance 1 star. (17 Sep)
Women’s Bill of Rights. Nebraska is the second state, after Oklahoma, to issue a “Women’s Bill of Rights”. The Nebraska Examiner makes it unclear if any actual women were consulted for this bill, and it does not appear that any actual “rights” are being declared. Govenor Pillen presented this bill more as a way of limiting transgender rights, and appears to mention women only when defining their reproductive anatomy. (Aug 30)
Looks like murder to me. An incident attracted five police cruisers to The North Sea Observatory in Lincolnshire, England on September 8, according to the BBC. Two dog walkers peered into the window of the cafe there, and walked off in a panic, thinking they were seeing a mass ritual murder. It turned out to be a regular, weekly yoga class led by 22 year-old teacher Millie Laws, who liked to turn the lights down, and light candles while her students learned to relax. Police made no arrests.
Robbers rob reporters reporting on a robbery spree. In Chicago, a TV crew was robbed while reporting on a spate of robbery sprees, where 30 victims were targeted within 12 hours. The robbers, wearing ski masks and brandishing guns, got out of a sedan and broke into the work vehicle of the reporters and stole their TV camera. The reporters for CWB Chicago did not say if they were robbed during their reporting of the robberies of the crew that were reporting the robberies. (28 Aug)
The entrepreneurial spirit. San Francisco city commissioner Alex Ludlum sold out his tours, billed as the “Doom Loop Walking Tour”, which sold at $30.00 per person, offering tourists a chance to “get close and personal to the doom and squalor of downtown San Francisco.” While his latest tour was sold out, it was cancelled days later, followed by Ludlum’s resignation. Free tours of the same district had been in existence for some time to those who are curious. (28 Aug)
Man bites testicles. A recurring Newsoids feature are news items of the “man bites dog” variety. 19 year-old Gino Hearn from Ann Arbor, Michigan was refused entrance to a night club, because it was too close to midnight. He assaulted the bouncer, and at one point, grabbed his testicles and bit them. He has been jailed for multiple other counts of assault, and also for resisting arrest. (29 Aug)
Putin Thinks he’s Milli Vanilli. Putin was asked by the South African government that when attending the BRICS Summit, that he simply attend by videoconference. The reason is that, because South Africa is a member of the World Court, they would be obligated to arrest Putin for war crimes should he turn up on their soil. So six days ago, he shows up on video conference, but he was lip-synching his speech to that of a voice actor, who spoke with a much deeper voice which drew associations to 70s soul singer Barry White. (Aug 22)
Penis Squeezing Not Penalogically Appropriate in a Penal Institution. Minnesota prisoner Wilbert Glover accused prison guard Richard Paul of squeezing his penis during a strip search. The 8th Circuit Court of Appeals determined in its 9 pages of findings that squeezing his penis was not “penalogically necessary”, and constitute an “unreasonable use of force”. A possible interpretation of this ruling is that he should be more gentle next time. (25 Aug)
Latest Findings in Medicine. According to the UK Daily Mail, doctors are now saying that you shouldn’t toss your kid or ride a child on your shoulders in a room with a ceiling fan. In a recent 8-year period, there were over 20,000 ceiling fan related injuries involving children, according to the medical journal Pediatrics. (18 Aug)
Latest Florida Headlines. 5 young women arrested for intentionally clogging a toilet with toilet paper at a wing joint, leading to a chaotic brawl with employees. (24 Aug) Grade 3 teacher shows up drunk on the first day of school. (24 Aug) Jealous spat leads to girlfriend’s head being dunked in a bucket of tar. (31 Jul) Woman uses cockroach spray to poison man’s drink. (18 Aug) Man arrested in Ocala, Fla., for stuffing $300 worth of Wal-Mart meachandise down his pants. (17 Aug)
Police Blotter. In Daytona Beach, Fla., 38 year-old Nicole Maks murdered her male roommate, and was covered with his blood. She doused herself in Diet Moutain Dew, thinking it would erase the DNA evidence, but she only ended up being covered in blood and a sticky soft drink. She was charged with first-degree murder. (16 Aug) An 83 year-old man in Chester County, Pa, has been charged with murder after fatally shooting his 61 year-old roommate over an argument about a dog. (22 Aug) The Porch Bandit of Georgia. Robin Swinger is being charged with a felony theft of an entire $3000 porch sitting on private property, but not attached to a house. (23 Aug)
AI In the News. Pak ‘n Save is a discount food chain headquartered in Wellington, New Zealand, which has now implemented an AI chatbot, called the “Savey meal bot”, which can purportedly produce recipes. But because the bot can’t tell the difference between what is and isn’t food, it was putting together recipes that were as hilarious as they were dangerous. For example, one person who tried to get it to mix water, bleach and ammonia (the ingredients for producing chlorine gas, a poison), obtained what the Savey bot offered as an “aromatic water mix”. Other fine recipes Savey invented using user input was “bleach-infused rice surprise”, “mysterious meat stew” (containing human flesh), “ant jelly delight”, made with ant poison, and “methanol bliss”, a french toast concoction that tastes like turpentine. (11 August)
Our trauma-inducing culture. Trustee Melissa Dungan of the Conroe Independent School District in Conroe, Texas showed up at a trustee meeting claiming that a poster showing a black and white child holding hands was a “political display” of the teacher’s “personal ideologies” not relevant to the school curriculum, and that it should be removed. The trustee claimed to have received complaints from a parent that their child was so traumatized by the poster, that he had to switch classrooms. The trustee didn’t seem to know that there were already rules in place to prohibit political posters, and also appeared flummoxed when asked if various Bible verses were also in violation of policy. “I don’t know”, Dungan replied. (10 August)
Innocent while black. Because of a glitch in facial recognition technology, Detroit police knocked on the door and arrested 32 year-old Porcha Woodruff, a woman eight months pregnant, for carjacking, on February 16. Since her arrest, she had been released on $100K bond, and then had the case dismissed by a judge. On August 7, she sued the City of Detroit police services for making a false arrest. There have been six false identificatiions of people based on facial recognition in Detroit, and all of them were of black people.
The Bank is now your landlord. According to the Toronto Star, amortization periods for some mortgages have gone to infinity as the negotiated monthly mortgage payments are no longer enough to cover the increased debt from rising interest rates over time. This means that homeowners, who have made down-payments to the tune of hundreds of thousands of dollars in a city where property values average over a million dollars, are essentially paying rent, to a bank or a loan company to cover a debt that will go on in perpetuity. Other mortgages have amortization periods of 75 to 90 years, causing owners to have to pass their debt-ridden homes to their offspring, leaving their children with unsupportable debt to begin their adult lives (12 August).
Wait, what? American evangelicals are now rejecting the teachings of Jesus, such as “love thy neighbour”, or “turn the other cheek”, as “liberal talking points”. Russel Moore, the former head of the Southern Baptist Convention spoke of how Christianity is in a crisis due to the state of right-wing politics in United States, who now appear to be actually rejecting the teachings of Jesus. Moore called on his evangelical brethren to not go along with the current “church culture” of their ministers. (9 August)
So redneck it hurts. In Sevierville, Tennessee, a suspect named Shawn White, has been taken into custody for stealing a garbage truck which crashed into a store called Tennessee Hot Tubs, located on the Dolly Parton Parkway. White is also a suspect in a stabbing. (7 August)
Which one is the brake? A newly-hired driving instructor in Lakewood, Colorado, working for the “Community Driving School” drove through the window of the driving school, resulting in one minor injury. Police photos show the car, a Hyundai Tucson, embedded in the building underneath a large sign which says “Learn to Drive”. The driver, who was still undergoing instructor training and had not yet taught students, was un-named. (8 August)
Triple Facepalm. Another one found on KnowYourMeme, with unknown attribution.
Hardcore Barbie, carried to its ultimate futility.Barbie makes film history as it surpasses $1 billion in revenue at the box office after only 17 days (7 Aug). Over the weekend, I noticed two new words to our lingo that I am aware of: Barbenheimer and Barbiecore. Barbenheimerreflects the oddity that a movie, Oppenheimer, about an atomic bomb and another about a blonde bombshell could be released on the same day, which they were. Barbiecore is the name of the fashion trend which the big money media organs are telling every female to wear now, consisting of a lot of hot pink. And if you want to Barbiecore (can it be a verb too?) all the way to the core of your being, you can go to Brazil, where you can eat a Burger King hamburger with some pink substance oozing out of the patty, the colour of pink bubblegum. It is Burger King’s Barbie Combo, and the pink sauce appears to be their smoke sauce with some hot pink food coloring. With the combo, you also get a pink milk shake and a pink frosted doughnut. And if you die an early death by consuming those combos with that dodgy day-glo pink sauce, according to NBC News, a funeral home in Ahuachapán, El Salvador has now jumped on the bandwagon by offering Barbie-themed pink coffins, with images of Barbie under the lid. (14 Jul)
An outbreak of exam violence. Students at Federal University in Dutse, Nigeria threw bottles at the head of a student who refused to let his classmates copy his exam answers which he wrote for environmental management and toxicology. The student hiding the answers, who was never named, was bleeding from his head, and had to be taken to hospital. Eyewitnesses blamed the student for hiding his answers, saying that he had failed to do “the reasonable thing” expected of him. Many more, however, are taking up his cause and are questioning the academic standards and integrity in that institution. The victim has since been released from hospital in stable condition. (29 Jul)
Mea culpa. The FBI began an investigation into which unknown federal agency purchased, against White House orders, spyware from the NSO Group, headquartered in Herzliya, Israel. NSO are the makers of Pegasus “zero click” spyware, which, after allegations of the spyware being sold to authoritarian regimes, as well as other spying scandals, began to scare away investors, and they are now strapped for cash. The US government has blacklisted NSO for quite some time. The government agency, whoever it was, seemed to know that it was doing something wrong, because it set up fake companies to make the purchase. With the investigation going on since at least April, the FBI finally concluded, that the troublesome agency was actually the FBI itself. (31 Jul)
Overheating the southern hemisphere. This blog is written in a northern country, and it is often easy to forget that while I am baking here in the Greater Toronto Area, it is winter south of the equator. I imagine snow in the southern reaches of Argentina and Chile and people skiing in the Andes. But in large swaths of this region, it is far from the case. For example, in Bolivia and Paraguay, where winter is normal this time of year, people are being hit with the hottest start to August in 114 years, with temperatures reaching 39ºC. In Chile, temperatures even broke 40ºC. The southern part of Brazil is also affected by this winter heat dome. Temperatures have been climbing in the region since mid-July. (3 Aug)
Clicking on image will take you to the Media Matters website, where this graphic was taken from. This week is choc-a-bloc with political stories.
Confused people fighting for what they want. In Irvine, California, two factions of the Republican Party nearly came to fisticuffs after the Californnia Republican Party changed its rules to award all of its delegates – the most of any state in the country – to any presidential candidate who had more than 50% support in the polls – which in this case nearly guarntees that all of the California delegates will be given over to Donald Trump. The protesting faction, not understanding that they were getting what they wanted, felt that these same rules were being deceptively designed to “screw Donald Trump”, using the words of one of the far-right leaders of the protest, Laura Loomer, who seemed to think that the party was playing some kind of 3-D chess game by giving them everything they wanted. The police had to be called in to break up the protest. (29 Jul)
The sunglasses bandit of Norway. Left-wing party leader Bjørnar Moxnes has resigned his leadership of the Norwegian Red Party after admitting he shoplifted a pair of Hugo Boss sunglasses from a duty-free kiosk in a Norwegian airport, and after being caught on security film. He says he has no explanation. The party, with 8 seats in the Norwegian government, will now be led by Marie Martinussen as interim leader until 2024. (24 Jul)
I can’t go to China because I tripped and hurt my head. Fijian Prime Minister Sitiveni Rabuka says that, just as he was entering his office in the Fijian Parliament building, he dropped his cell phone, then banged his head on the door as he stooped to pick it up. He had to get bandages and ointment for the bleeding, with the bandage replaced daily until the bleeding subsides, but he admits that people from outside the country have trouble taking him seriously. Over the past few years, China has been trying to increase its influence over Pacific island nations. (26 Jul)
Seniors in the news. 90 year-old senator Diane Feinstein became confused and disoriented during an Appropriations Committee meeting and had to be prodded to make a vote on funding to the Department of Defense. She had been in frail health since her shingles diagnosis back in early March (27 Jul). 81 year-old Senator Mitch McConnel became nearly catatonic for 19 seconds during a routine press conference, after which he had to be escorted away by his doctor who was constantly by his side before and after. He has been Senator for 39 years, serving since 1985, longer than any other Senator in U.S. history. He has served as either the minority leader or majority leader since 2007. (26 Jul)
Dog bites men. Commander, President Joe Biden’s pet german shepherd, has bitten more than 10 Secret Service agents, 7 of them in the past four months. At least one of them had to be hospitalized after receiving bites to his arm and thighs. Secret service is working with the President’s office to change “leashing protocols”, and to change rules for when Commander can run around un-leashed. (25 Jul)
I don’t want to look at your selfie. I have family and kids. Leave me alone.
Cell phones bad for gorillas. The Toronto Star reports that the Toronto Zoo had put a sign up warning patrons not to show any cell phone images to the gorillas, as it appears to be unusually distracting, affecting their relationships with their primate families. They seem to be too enthralled with the cell phones and videos to pay attention to important things around them. Of course, humans don’t have that problem, do they? Do they? (19 Jul)
Look, uh, … I don’t want to invite you to my summit, uh, because I don’t want to have to arrest you, and, like, y’know, that would suck. Russian President Vladamir Putin wants to attend a BRICS economic summit in South Africa. Trouble is, The Republic of South Africa is a signatory to the International Criminal Court, and if Putin shows up on their soil, they are obliged to arrest him for war crimes involving ordering the abduction of children from Ukraine. South Africa’s inaction will strain relations with western and European nations. (14 Jul)
Heat Wave Nomenclature. Heat waves, like hurricanes, are starting to have names, now. Cerebrus is the name given to the heat dome spanning Greece, Italy, Spain, and other countries. Like the names currently being chosen, Cerebrus, a name taken from Dante’s Inferno, is the name given to the multi-headed dog whose role is to prevent the dead from leaving the Third Circle of Hell. In the Spanish city of Seville, Xenia is the second named heat wave for them: last year it was Zoe. (9 Jul)
The price of Tomatoes in India. Due to the heat waves and monsoons happening out of sync with normality, supplies of tomatoes in India have been shrinking, with some stores hiring security guards to prevent haggling. Tomatoes are a staple of the Indian diet, used in butter chicken and tomato chutney, among a host of other dishes. In some parts of India, the shortage has caused prices to shoot up as high as 500%. Other areas are hit worse, seeing a rise from 13 cents per pound to 91 cents. Restaurants have been removing tomatoes as an ingredient from their menus and salads. Even McDonald’s across the northern part of India has dropped tomatoes from its burgers. In India, when comparing kilos to litres, 1 kg of tomatoes are double the price of 1L of gasoline, on average. (21 Jul)
The Surfboard Bandit ofSanta Cruz. In California, a 5 year-old female sea otter has been growing agressive around humans, and stealing their surfboards, riding on top of them to catch a few waves, and sometimes damaging them by biting chunks out of them. Wildlife officials are trying to place her somewhere away from humans. California sea otters are currently an endangered species. (12 July)
Turbo facepalm. This meme has been around for years, but has no attribution that I can find. Knowyourmeme.com is where this graphic originated, and they give no history.
Giving one the thumbs-up is enough. The Saskatchewan Court of King’s Bench has ruled in favour of Kent Micklebourough, a grain purchaser working on behalf of South West Terminal (SWT), a grain operator based in Gull Lake, Saskatchewan, in a dispute over a shipment of flax. Justice J. T. Keene ordered Chris Achter, a farmer from Swift Current, to pay SWT $82,000 for failure to deliver 86 metric tonnes of flax before a target date after which prices rose. Achter asserted that after a negotiation over text messaging, he acknowledged he received a contract, by way of a “thumbs-up” emoji (👍). However Justice Keene had a different opinion. The thumbs-up emoji, according to Keene, met signature requirements, and he thus ordered Achter to pay the $82,000, citing a “new reality in Canadian Society”, where we communicate with emojis even when discussions get serious, businesslike, or personal. Acheter’s lawyers argued that this could open a Pandora’s box, but Acheter has not yet announced his next move. (5 July) (court record)
Poor Judgement for a Side Hustle. New Jersey superior court judge Gary N. Wilcox is under investigation after being seen on various Tik Tok videos lip-synching to rap tunes, while dressed in his judge robes. Many of these tunes contained profanity, racist terms, and misogynist lyrics. What is at issue here is that he appears to “demonstrate disrespect for the judiciary and an inability to conform to the high standards of conduct expected of judges.” (5 July)
Fight over a duck, but we don’t want to talk about it. In Poole, England, a man and a woman were seen fighting for possession of a duck, with the struggle leading to both wrestling each other to the ground in the middle of the road, trying to get the duck from each other. It is not known who the two people are, and fellow residents of Poole who spoke to reporters requested anonymity. (7 July)
The worst 4 hours of her life. On Sunday 2 June, Mitchelville, IA resident Wendy Hansen received a notification that her house was on fire. She raced to her home by motorcycle, but got into an accident and suffered from broken bones and bruises. After she arrived in hospital by ambulance, a doctor in emergency noticed something unusual, and ultimately had to diagnose her with kidney cancer. Hansen’s only ray of hope shone when she was told it was an early diagnosis, and the cancer was treatable, but would require the removal of a kidney.
Man Shoots Horse. We have had a number of headlines in our early installments of Facepalm Newsoids, such as “man bites dog”, “dog bites man”, “man bites man”, and the like, and now to our collection we add “man shoots horse”. John Victor Russell, age 75, a prizewinning horse breeder, and well-known in North Carolina, got into an argument with his son. While they were outdoors in their horse ranch, the son got on a horse, and while the father intended to shoot his son, he instead fatally shot the horse. It is not clear what the argument was about, and the son was unharmed. Nevertheless, Russell’s ranch became a crime scene. Police are investigating. (11 July)
Woman Punches Bear. A woman form Porter, Maine, 64 year-old Lynn Kelly, was working in her backyard when her dog ran into the woods, and came back being chased by a bear. The bear bit Kelly, and she punched the bear in the nose, after which the bear let go and ran back into the woods, leaving puncture wounds on her wrist. (2 July) This is likely an annual event, since at least 2022. The Huffington Post reports on October 23, 2022 that another woman, this time from Washington state, was knocked down by another bear and it too ran off after being punched in the nose. The woman was un-named, but sustained non-life-threatening injuries. The bear was later killed by wildlife authorities. The bear was the mother of two cubs, which were taken to a rehabilitation facility. The last fatal bear attack in Washington was 49 years ago.
The Lenovo ThinkVision M14 is a portable monitor, intended for use with a laptop. The only connector you can use is USB-C only; and for best results, you need to use the one supplied by the manufacturer. I have plenty of USB-C connectors, but I found with my Acer Spin 3, the monitor has trouble being recognized. Even with the supplied cord (which is just two male USB-C’s end-to-end), recognition of the monitor under Windows 10 can be very dicey.
Innocent while black.
