Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

So many bastards, so little time.

Why is it so hard for them to condemn hate?

When do we start airlifting the women and children out of Texas?

Let us savor the impending downfall of lawless scoundrels who richly deserve the trouble barreling their way.

Consistently wrong since 2002

We’ve had enough carrots to last a lifetime. break out the sticks.

Stamping your little feets and demanding that they see how important you are? Not working anymore.

I was confident that someone would point it out and thought why not me.

My years-long effort to drive family and friends away has really paid off this year.

Nothing worth doing is easy.

Too often we confuse noise with substance. too often we confuse setbacks with defeat.

Damn right I heard that as a threat.

Give the craziest people you know everything they want and hope they don’t ask for more? Great plan.

Not so fun when the rabbit gets the gun, is it?

If you tweet it in all caps, that makes it true!

We’re not going back!

“In the future, this lab will be a museum. don’t touch it.”

It’s a doggy dog world.

When your entire life is steeped in white supremacy, equality feels like discrimination.

Schmidt just says fuck it, opens a tea shop.

Since when do we limit our critiques to things we could do better ourselves?

We are aware of all internet traditions.

Republicans are the party of chaos and catastrophe.

After roe, women are no longer free.

You are here: Home / Nature & Respite / Respite Open Thread

Respite Open Thread

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HAPPY NEWS EVERYONE — PAUL BRONKS IS BACK!

Also good for quick-hit twitter distraction, 41 Strange:

… and Haggard Hawks, language spelunker:

Reader Interactions

69Comments

  5. 5.

    MisterForkbeard

    The REAL burning question for the night is: What Nintendo game is Starfish going to be playing?

  9. 9.

    khead

    So, we just brought kitteh number nine into our home tonight.  Ok, well, we moved her from the garage to the basement. She had been in the garage since last week.  A beautiful little Calico.  Yes, I said number nine.  We must be nuts.  Will post some pics later.

  11. 11.

    Feathers

    @chris: Holy crap, that car is crazy! Reminds me of the concrete boats civil engineers will decide to build on a dare.

    If you are into antique cook books, The Schlesinger Library at Radcliffe has an annual book sale where they sell off donated books which are duplicates of books they already have in their collections. Cookbooks are one of their specialties, they have Julia Child’s papers. Highly recommended, there are professional collectors and sellers, of course, but I have always  managed to find some really interesting books for my mother’s large collection.

  14. 14.

    Goku (aka Amerikan Baka)

    Any Person of Interest fans out there? I really enjoyed the increased sci-fi focus the show had later on with the Samaritan AI trying to take over the world and manipulate humanity from behind the scenes.

    I do have a few questions for discussion for any POI fans:

    Did Greer ever consider the possibility that Samaritan might destroy humanity entirely if it felt that was in it’s best interests or if we eventually outlived our usefulness to it? He was a pretty big misanthrope IIRC.

    Secondly, what do you guys think would’ve happened if Samaritan had somehow been exposed to the public like the Machine had been? Would it have taken more overt measures to control humanity, such as taking down entire electrical grids or even seizing control of the world’s nuclear arsenals?

    Edit: Also, any SVU fans? I’ve only ever watched the earlier seasons (1-12). It’s a guilty pleasure of mine, but good god was Stabler a maniac

    Was there any police brutality or civil rights violations on Law and Order that was treated as ok by the narrative?

  16. 16.

    counterfactual

    In 2019 I went from 1 cat to no cat to 2 cats, and though they’re from different states they look like brothers in coloration though one Is long-hair. Now if the new one will learn that he *doesn’t* need to did his claws into my thigh to get my attention.

  17. 17.

    WaterGirl

    @satby: My niece went to Florida for a post-holiday vacation, and apparently the hotel – besides the usual shampoos, etc – left them a gift back with a dildo and lube.

    Is that a thing???

  18. 18.

    Martin

    @Feathers: Reminds me of the concrete boats civil engineers will decide to build on a dare.

    It’s not a dare, but a regular ASCE competition.

    They aren’t terribly difficult to build. Concrete is about 2.5x more dense than water, Steel is 7.8x more dense and nobody is that shocked when they see a modern ocean vessel.

  19. 19.

    mad citizen

    Love the Helicron.  I like to watch videos of steam trains, such as the Big Boy locomotive: “Big Boy #4014 Limon to Denver, Colorado November, 2019”.  It’s been touring around to commemorate the 150th anniversary of the transcontinental railroad in the U.S.  So cool to see old technology at work on our current infrastructure.

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SJufJDoahpE

  20. 20.

    Gin & Tonic

    Mentioned this deep in a Wilmer thread, probably not a good spot. My son visited the old Museum of Archaeology in Tbilisi and sent me a pic. The museum is abandoned. I found that really funny.

  23. 23.

    Steeplejack

    @Goku (aka Amerikan Baka):

    I was a big fan of Person of Interest, and I was open to the sci-fi turn, but I thought the ending of the series was a disappointing muddle. Because of that, I’m not prepared to discuss the theoretical ramifications.

    It’s interesting: there are some series where I find myself watching the reruns and others I don’t. Like I said, I really liked Person of Interest, but I rarely watch the reruns. Elementary, on the other hand, I like watching the reruns a lot.

    Which reminds me: I just realized earlier today that I never saw the last two or three episodes of the series! Need to look those up.

  30. 30.

    Kent

    @Steeplejack:  i watched a couple of Person of Interest episodes years ago but never really got into it.

    But I do need a new SciFi series now that I finished the new season of Expanse and watched Lost in Space with my kids.  What else is out there?

  34. 34.

    khead

    @satby:

    Thank you. Mrs Khead has always wanted a calico… and… here we are.  Showed up on our porch 6 months ago and we finally took her in.  Still needs a vet trip. We are hoping she is ok.

  36. 36.

    NotMax

    Fell into a deep internet hole researching the history and designs of compressed air amplified and the rarer fluid amplified gramophones (a href=”https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J7SV65DFNy8″>example of the former).

    There are times when delving into the obscure or the arcane is akin to a short vacation.

  37. 37.

    satby

    OMG, still laughing over the Amazon reviews ???

    Warning: start slow. I’m not kidding. I’m not over sensitive at all and level 4 can be too much. Whatever, you know what? Do what you want. You’ll figure it out when you start to hear colors.

  38. 38.

    NotMax

    @NotMax
    Linky fix; no edit.

    Fell into a deep internet hole researching the history and designs of compressed air amplified and the rarer fluid amplified gramophones (example of the former).

    There are times when delving into the obscure or the arcane is akin to a short vacation.

  40. 40.

    delk

    @satby: I started when I was 45 years old. My husband went back to grad school to get some more letters after his name. I wanted a nice quiet hobby so I didn’t bother him while he was studying. ?

  41. 41.

    satby

    I have to stop reading these because I’ll die laughing:

    I been smiling all week. I even had a Republican at my doorstep and I didn’t cuss him out I just told them to leave and have a good day ??. I swear I’m a changed woman???

  42. 42.

    Steeplejack

    @Kent:

    Person of Interest got off to a slow start. The first season was mostly episodic one-offs, but it got a lot stronger, especially as the background story arc got “deeper.”

    As I think about it, I am struck by the strong cast of (well-written) supporting characters, especially those played by Taraji P. Henson, Amy Acker, Sarah Shahi and Kevin Chapman. Paige Turco was also memorable as a political fixer who had a lot of chemistry with Jim Caviezel’s character.

    I’d say it’s worth giving it a second chance, maybe through the first season.

  43. 43.

    Woodrow/asim

    @Goku (aka Amerikan Baka): Yeah huge PERSON OF INTEREST fan. In fact, I’m planning a RPG game set in the CYBERPUNK 2020 ‘verse based loosely on the series.

    Did Greer ever consider the possibility that Samaritan might destroy humanity entirely

    Greer had given up on Humanity. If Samaritan chose to wipe out

    That said, Samaritan needed humans — it was built to protect us, and it didn’t have hands to keep running power systems and manage server farms.

    So, yeah, slavery/puppets would have been fine. *shudder*

    Secondly, what do you guys think would’ve happened if Samaritan had somehow been exposed to the public like the Machine had been?

    To be clear — The Machine was never exposed publicly. If you’re referring to the video trial at end of Season 3, note what Fusco says during the blackout — it was a purely kangaroo count that was never broadcast.

    That said, such an act would have undoubtedly been predicted (that’s literally why both the Machine and Samaritan exist, to predict actions), and as such, Samaritan would have plans within plans to minimize its effects, if it found it was unable to stop the publicity for some reason.

  44. 44.

    Kent

    I’m not exactly sure what to make of this.   Eugene Robinson, a black columnist, complaining that the Democratis are becoming a whites-only party in the 2020 primary: https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/democrats-are-pushing-diversity-off-the-stage/2020/01/02/8596e64c-2da6-11ea-bcd4-24597950008f_story.html

    But not one single mention of WHY Harris, Booker, Castro, and perhaps Patrick are not getting any traction.  Which is mainly because Black Democrats massively prefer Biden.  What does Robinson expect when the Black and Hispanic wings of the party don’t support Black and Hispanic candidates?

    It’s not my place to tell Blacks and Hispanics who to vote for.  But it’s pretty disingenuous for a columnist to bemoan the lack of Black and Hispanic candidates when they can’t get traction with Black and Hispanic voters.   What else is the DNC supposed to do?  Tilt the process more heavily in favor of minority candidates?  Create quotas or something?  I really don’t know.  I started as a Harris supporter and I just find this whole election cycle frustrating as hell.

  45. 45.

    Goku (aka Amerikan Baka)

    @Steeplejack:

    What about it seemed muddled, out of curiosity?

    And yeah, I liked watching Elementary, too, though I think I only watched the first three or four seasons. BTW, do Watson and Sherlock ever hook up? I think they’re best as friends however

  46. 46.

    Woodrow/asim

    @Steeplejack: Seconded. I watched the 1st episode, and although it had some interesting stuff (esp. the fight scene set to Massive Attack), I set it aside.

    It wasn’t until I read some really well-written overviews during Season 2, post-Snowden, after we came to realize that this series was terrifying on-point about the American Surveillance state, that I got into it. And that wasn’t because it was predicative, but because it’s a series with a lot of heart. It’s rarte you get a series like this with every character, even the supporting case, so on-point and compelling.

    It’s a slow burn — but unlike a lot of series, those early episodes do so much work to set characters plot, and tone. They’re not bad, just more like X-Files where the early episodes are mostly stand-alone and pretty good…

    …but in this case, the myth-arc is very much worth the investment.

  47. 47.

    Mike in NC

    Netflix is now streaming Season 3 of “Occupied”, an excellent Norweigian show about an energy crisis that involves the country being taken over by the Russians to control oil production. The USA is self-sufficient and isolationist and has largely withdrawn from international affairs.

  48. 48.

    Kent

    @Mike in NC: Yes, Occupied is great.  There are some really compelling dramas coming out of Scandinavia.   I also like the Finnish detective show Borderland about a quirky brainiac Finnish detective and badass female Russian former GRU operative who solve crimes and deal with both of their troublesome teenage daughters.

    Also the Icelandic series on Amazon called Trapped in which troubled teen children of the detectives play major roles.   I have daughters the same age so I sympathize!

  49. 49.

    Steeplejack

    @Goku (aka Amerikan Baka):

    No, Watson and Holmes do not hook up! Yet another cliché avoided by the series.

    As for Person of Interest, once Samaritan was introduced as an evil twin of the Machine, the series devolved into a succession of cliff-hanger set pieces ending with the apocalyptic finale. Meh.

  50. 50.

    Woodrow/asim

    @Kent: Which is mainly because Black Democrats massively prefer Biden.

    Robinson’s a good columnist. The issue is that we’re stuck in a world where the issues we’re seeing right now are not only systemic, but hard to write about and break down.

    Notice that no one’s really willing to ask folx in the African-American community WHY we prefer Biden in general. And sadly, Robinson’s not really covering that, because, well, that’s part of being taken granted — it’s insidious.

    I’ll say this — the solution lines, in part, in what Stacey Abrams is doing. Stop mono-focusing on winning Big Races — esp. the Presidency. We’re not going to resolve these issues by playing by the same playbook as the processes that got us into these holes, to begin with!

  51. 51.

    Ruckus

    @Mary G:

    It looks exactly like someone with way too much money and zero taste of any kind and the goal is to spend as much as you want to fulfill any obnoxious desire, not to actually have a home.

  53. 53.

    Kent

    @Woodrow/asim: Yes, the white Evangelical Christian right runs candidates in every damn school board and town council election.  While Dems have a hard time focusing on anything less than a governor’s race.  And then we wonder why the crazies are in control in so many places.

    I don’t know the answer.  But I do know that sheer political talent trumps all.  Which is how we ended up with a Black president with a terrorist name.  I’m honestly not that familiar with Stacy Abrams living here in the Northwest.  But the focus on voting rights that she is leading along with Eric Holder are immensely important. If I was God and got to pick one or two major legislative victories in the next administration it would be voting rights and climate change, not healthcare.

  55. 55.

    SectionH

    @mad citizen: Very Cool! I’m not exactly a railroad fan, but some of my best friends were/are… and I made Mr S sit up and google the Big Boy tonight. He’s now deep into some train stuff. It’s not often I can point him at something he didn’t know. (Wikipedia’s very up-to-date on the 4014, to their credit.)

  56. 56.

    Goku (aka Amerikan Baka)

    @Steeplejack:

    Are cliches always bad things, tho? In Castle, the main leads got together and that was one of the best parts of the show until it got bungled towards the end thanks to some behind the scenes drama Stana Kadic apparently, causing the series to be cut short.

    One of the pratfalls of these romantic subplots is that at some point once the two characters get together, there’s usually annoying attempts to create conflict and drama by breaking the couple up. I remember Lois and Clark was infamous for this, with the time Lois was framed for murder and up for the death penalty.

  58. 58.

    SectionH

    @SectionH: And to be clear, the “were” refers to a couple of dear friends who’ve died, not “we’re no longer friends.” Kind of depressing I thought I needed to specify that, but these days…

  60. 60.

    Goku (aka Amerikan Baka)

    @Woodrow/asim:

    Greer had given up on Humanity. If Samaritan chose to wipe out

    Um, I don’t think you finished this sentence. What did you intend to say?

    To be clear — The Machine was never exposed publicly. If you’re referring to the video trial at end of Season 3, note what Fusco says during the blackout — it was a purely kangaroo count that was never broadcast.

    Yeah, I remember that. But I could have sworn the Machine was exposed and that was why the federal government had to shut down the Machine officially, with Team Machine saving a copy of the Machine, running it on like a hundred PS4s of all things lol

    That said, such an act would have undoubtedly been predicted (that’s literally why both the Machine and Samaritan exist, to predict actions), and as such, Samaritan would have plans within plans to minimize its effects, if it found it was unable to stop the publicity for some reason

    Thanks! I do think that would have made for a very interesting twist in the overall plot of the show, with Samaritan trying to overtly threaten the world into submission when backed into a corner. But yeah, I’m sure it would’ve been difficult to impossible to leak info on Samaritan

  61. 61.

    SectionH

    @khead: She’s lovely! And it looks from the photo as if she’s got the black of a calico, but her “orange” is almost a dilute calico. Which is intriguing to me as a Mom to 2 Dilute Calicos. Both rescues, but one was a long hair, extremely Floofy, and the most terrifyingly intelligent cat/dog/more than Republicans critter I’ve ever met. The other one was a shorthair, sweeter than honey, and an idiot.

    Best wishes for your new addition to your family.

  62. 62.

    ruemara

    @Kent: Black Dems are waiting to see what white people will support. Much like watching a dangerous creature you have to live with to figure out what moves are acceptable for it’s knee jerk tendency towards violence. Who knows why they might have this perception of white people? But if white people demonstrated that they could listen to a candidate of color that didn’t center all their policy on them, they probably would have felt more comfortable supporting them.

  63. 63.

    Steeplejack (phone)

    @Goku (aka Amerikan Baka):

    You ask if clichés are bad and then you give examples of exactly the problems they cause. WTF.

    For what it’s worth, I read that the problems on Castle were caused by Nathan Fillion being a total dick to Stana Katic. But everyone loves him because of Firefly. However, I could be behind on my second-tier celebrity research.

  64. 64.

    Goku (aka Amerikan Baka)

    @Steeplejack (phone):

    You ask if clichés are bad and then you give examples of exactly the problems they cause. WTF.

    Well, imo, those problems only creep in because either the story doesn’t end with the hookup or the conflict for the story isn’t external to the relationship. That’s not to say that relationship drama can’t be a good source of conflict, but it can be done stupidly, like in Lois and Clark

    Anyway, did not know that Fillion was the problem. He has a new show, The Rookie now.

  65. 65.

    JGabriel

    @WaterGirl: 

    My niece went to Florida for a post-holiday vacation, and apparently the hotel – besides the usual shampoos, etc – left them a gift back with a dildo and lube.

    Are they sure it was a dildo and not just a gift sculpture of Florida? Because I’ve heard that most dildos do a passable impression of Florida if you point them south x south-east.

  66. 66.

    opiejeanne

    @Steeplejack (phone): I’ve read that the problem with the relationship between the two characters was mutual, described by one person from the show as he wanted to move on once a scene was shot and she wanted to do it over and over until she thought it was perfect.

    I don’t think either of them was necessarily a dick to the other, and Filion has not been described that way by cast and crew on other shows. I think they just rubbed each other the wrong way, which is a shame.

  67. 67.

    J R in WV

    Regarding cats at the vet, we’ve had some self-assured cats in the past, big white toms with red/orange marks, that didn’t mind a vet appointment at all. Ralph, a 20 pound purr monster could be left on a chair in the waiting room, and would come to the exam room when called. The Vet was stunned to see him hop down off his chair and stroll into the exam room. Pretty funny.

    Same for Rufus later on, not quite as big as Ralph, but just as self assured. Never worried about other cats of dogs, king of his universe. Happy to see his vet as needed.

    Current cats need dropped into cat carrier rapidly, before they realize what’s about to happen. Vet tech takes top off carrier for access to cat, which surprised me, but it worked out well.

  68. 68.

    WaterGirl

    @Gin & Tonic: Late back to the thread, but this was my niece, her sister, and her sister’s 13-year-old daughter.  All very religious.  All I know is that they thought they were going to a regular hotel.

  69. 69.

    WaterGirl

    @JGabriel:

    Are they sure it was a dildo and not just a gift sculpture of Florida? Because I’ve heard that most dildos do a passable impression of Florida if you point them south x south-east.

    Not sure if this was meant as a joke or not, but just in case… why the lube in the bag with “Florida”?

    Upon second reading, I am thinking you were not being serious, but I’ll leave that above just in case.

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