Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

This isn’t Democrats spending madly. This is government catching up.

Pessimism assures that nothing of any importance will change.

Optimism opens the door to great things.

“Jesus paying for the sins of everyone is an insult to those who paid for their own sins.”

Authoritarian republicans are opposed to freedom for the rest of us.

Red lights blinking on democracy’s dashboard

It may be funny to you motherfucker, but it’s not funny to me.

They love authoritarianism, but only when they get to be the authoritarians.

Jack be nimble, jack be quick, hurry up and indict this prick.

Many life forms that would benefit from greater intelligence, sadly, do not have it.

They’re not red states to be hated; they are voter suppression states to be fixed.

The party of Reagan has become the party of Putin.

Let’s delete this post and never speak of this again.

Happy indictment week to all who celebrate!

One of our two political parties is a cult whose leader admires Vladimir Putin.

Somebody needs to explain to DeSantis that nobody needs to do anything to make him look bad.

If you’re looking for someone who’s young and athletic, go watch a fucking movie.

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

GOP baffled that ‘we don’t care if you die’ is not a winning slogan.

I have other things to bitch about but those will have to wait.

Is it negotiation when the other party actually wants to shoot the hostage?

if you can’t see it, then you are useless in the fight to stop it.

I also would like a pony to improve my balloon juice experience.

Republicans: The threats are dire, but my tickets are non-refundable!

You are here: Home / Open Threads / Heads Up: I Am Going to Be Trying Some Things

Heads Up: I Am Going to Be Trying Some Things

by | 118 Comments

This post is in: , ,

Just a heads up that I am about to try some things, so please don’t be alarmed if things look different for the next little while.

Update at 2:45 pm:  I am done trying things out.  You may unfasten your seat belts.

“354” Data Centers, if you’re listening: you need to change your name from 365 to “Down for 11 days and counting”.

Adding a link to test it in dark mode.

Reader Interactions

118Comments

  1. 1.

    SpaceUnit

    Um . . . what sort of things?

    Should we put on a helmet? Strap ourselves in?

  3. 3.

    SpaceUnit

    I’m imagining being on a commercial flight, maybe 30 thousand feet up, just sitting there reading a magazine, when the captain comes on the intercom to tell the passengers to buckle up because he’s going to try some things.

  5. 5.

    Old School

    This isn’t going to be like when Mrs. School says, “Notice anything different?”, is it?

  7. 7.

    WaterGirl

    ‘@Baud

    And the balloon guy in the upper right-hand corner isn’t fuzzy anymore.

  8. 8.

    SpaceUnit

    It’s going to be like that cartoon where Bugs Bunny and Yosemite Sam are in an airplane and everything’s going to shit and they press the ‘robot pilot’ button.

    The robot pilot comes out of its compartment, looks around to see what’s going on. Then it grabs the only parachute and jumps.

  9. 9.

    Baud

    ‘@WaterGirl

    I’m on my phone. Balloon guy is a large image underneath the comments. But not fuzzy.

  11. 11.

    Gary K

    Don’t be alarmed, even if it seems like something Zaphod Beeblebrox might say.

  12. 12.

    WaterGirl

    ‘@Baud

    I imagine the whole sidebar is at the bottom on your phone, so that makes sense.

  13. 13.

    scav

    ‘@Baud
    Welllllll, might be best not to grab the flying paper towels from the truly deserving . . . .

  15. 15.

    Hildebrand

    ‘You’ve redecorated…I don’t like it.’

    (A comment made by previous incarnations of Doctor Who upon seeing a new Tardis set up.)

  17. 17.

    WaterGirl

    FYI I just uploaded the “Pro” version of the them we were using, and it took away a lot of what I had added before.

    Hang in there while I try to get things set up.

  18. 18.

    scav

    Oh, we haven’t had this sort of real-time fun in a long long time. The days when if we didn’t close a bracket the entire site would go italic or end up in a box quote . ..

  24. 24.

    piratedan

    is this one of those, I have to go and see if there’s still a Trojan in the nightstand drawer kind of things?

  29. 29.

    randy khan

    I don’t see anything different.

    Oh, wait, Is the site *supposed* to be in Elvish?

  30. 30.

    Scout211

    I like this, at least at the current stage I am seeing. (More changes could be coming . . .)

    I really like gray with polka dots in the background between the separate sections. That really highlights the sections and (for me) makes the whole blog way easier to read and find sections.

    WaterGirl, you deserve a raise!

    OMG! Edit! No more typos! (Who am I kidding . . . )

  32. 32.

    Soprano2

    So it looks great so far. Does this mean we think we’re going to be here for awhile? I’m especially appreciative about the edit function, I use that all the time.

  33. 33.

    James E Powell

    ‘@Baud

    I’m thinking it’s more like something bad happened to the theater – fire, flood, closing, whatever – the cast & crew are all dejected. Then the star jumps up and says, “Wait a minute, we can do the show right here!” I feel like that happened in at least one movie, but I can’t recall a title. Mickey Rooney? Danny Kaye? Maybe I imagined it.

  34. 34.

    WaterGirl

    I don’t have any more information than we shared yesterday.

    But I won’t be surprised if we are here for another week, so I’m trying to add what I can to make it. I hoped this would allow for setting the font color for commenting, that it might offer “replies”, and maybe even numbered comments, but we are 0 for 3 on those.

    edit: Also, I was finding all the gray really depressing.

  35. 35.

    WaterGirl

    There’s also Dark Mode, which I am going to turn on now just for a minute to see what it looks like.

  36. 36.

    trollhattan

    Horrid then, horrid later, horrid still later, horrid…today! Henry the K, everyone.

    “May 24, 2022 at 1:00 pm EDT By Taegan Goddard

    “Henry Kissinger has urged the West to stop trying to inflict a crushing defeat on Russian forces in Ukraine, warning that it would have disastrous consequences for the long term stability of Europe,” the Telegraph reports.

    Said Kissinger: “Negotiations need to begin in the next two months before it creates upheavals and tensions that will not be easily overcome. Ideally, the dividing line should be a return to the status quo ante. Pursuing the war beyond that point would not be about the freedom of Ukraine, but a new war against Russia itself.”

    What in the actual fuck is he doing here, cashing a large check? Shut up, ya gobshite.

  39. 39.

    Old School

    Recommendations for renaming Army bases:

    The full list of recommendations:

    Fort AP Hill, Va., to Fort Walker, for Dr. Mary Edwards Walker.

    Fort Benning, Ga., to Fort Moore, after Hal and Julia Moore.

    Fort Bragg, N.C., to Fort Liberty.

    Fort Gordon, Ga., to Fort Eisenhower, for President Dwight D. Eisenhower.

    Fort Hood, Tex., to Fort Cavazos, for Richard Cavazos.

    Fort Lee, Va., to Fort Gregg-Adams, for Arthur Gregg and Charity Adams.

    Fort Pickett, Va., to Fort Barfoot, Van Barfoot.

    Fort Polk, La., to Fort Johnson for William Henry Johnson.

    Fort Rucker, Ala., to Fort Novosel, for Michael Novosel.

  40. 40.

    Tony Jay

    I wonder if this bespoke, artisan site could support the weight of a 6000 word + rant….

    I keed. I keed.

  43. 43.

    WaterGirl

    I don’t ever use dark mode. There’s something called “Light/Dark Theme Toggle”, which i just turned on as an experiment.

    Is there some magic key combination that allows individual people to toggle from light to dark?

  47. 47.

    dmsilev

    ‘@trollhattan: I guess “status quo ante” when is the question. Status quo circa January this year still leaves Russia with a large chunk of Eastern Ukraine. Status quo ante 2014 which arguably is when this war really began, on the other hand, would be a pretty reasonable outcome.

  49. 49.

    frosty

    No complaints from me. Keep tweaking as you want, I’ll read whatever comes up in the screen.

  53. 53.

    Scout211

    WaterGirl May 24, 2022 at 2:26 PM

    Maybe it just means that the blog now will work in both light and dark mode for those of us with devices that can toggle back and forth from light to dark mode. Maybe?

  54. 54.

    raven

    water girl
    1. QuickShade

    QuickShade is the best app for controlling brightness on your Mac and dimming the screen below the standard minimum brightness. You can download it directly from the App Store, and once you open the app, and you’ll see a brightness icon added to your menu bar.

    Click it, and you’ll see a slider to increase or decrease the brightness.

  55. 55.

    Tony Jay

    ‘@Watergirl
    Anne Laurie’s already got one I sent to her last week. I figure that was what broke the blog so she’s been keeping it locked up in her virtual basement until it stops twitching.

    The follow-up is only half the size. 8-)

  56. 56.

    WaterGirl

    ‘@Scout211

    I hope someone who uses dark mode or toggles to it sometimes will answer the question. I left the toggle enabled, so I hope to know what does so I know whether I should leave it toggled or not. :-)

  57. 57.

    lowtechcyclist

    Just clicked to the main page from the previous thread and, oooh, nice!!

    ETA: So WTG, WG!!!

  61. 61.

    WaterGirl

    I just answered my own question about dark / light mode toggle.

    There is a toggle at the top with a sun and a moon in the line that says:

    Jackal Action Home away from home for Balloon Juice

  62. 62.

    NotMax

    There was a disturbance in the Force, as if millions of serifs cried out at once and then went silent.

    //

  63. 63.

    Yutsano

    I just switched onto dark mode which is how I like to read things like Twitter on my phone and such. Is there a control to change the font to a lighter colour in dark mode? Please and thank you!

  64. 64.

    WaterGirl

    ‘@Yutsano

    Nope. If I could control that, I would be making the comment font darker in light mode! :-)

  65. 65.

    krackenJack

    My self-image has gone from snarling jackal to frightened guinea pig just like that…

  66. 66.

    CaseyL

    Hey! I love what you’ve done with the place!

    Seriously: it looks like a real blog now, not like a subway tunnel that we’re camping out in for the duration.*

    Great work, and thanks!

    *Not to take anything away from the work you did to get that up. Saved a lot of us from homesickness. This just looks… homier.

  67. 67.

    WaterGirl

    ‘@CaseyL

    It did feel like a gray subway tunnel! Perfect description. All the gray was getting to me.

  70. 70.

    WaterGirl

    ‘@pacem appellant

    That is a most excellent question. Maybe now that this place looks more like a blog than the subway tunnel CaseyL mentioned… well, maybe we should.

  71. 71.

    Scout211

    Trying this again: there are new comments on that Reddit thread from someone who says they are an employee:

    https://www.reddit.com/r/sysadmin/comments/urybn4/comment/i9rg0f8/

    “ ahaha…the full details of this are too embarrassing to share publicly, but basically it was a combination of an exploit and poor security practice.
    we have “cybersecurity” insurance, idk if that’s the same thing.
    I don’t think so. we had a few “cloud” locations and I think backups may have been done between them, but not to anywhere else.
    this really has nothing to do with stone court. 365 bought atlantic metro communications (amc) late in 2020, and the stuff that went down is all legacy-amc stuff (very little technical integration has happened since the acquisition). there was definitely a difference between the amc way of doing things and the 365 way of doing things. both were/are pretty poor. opinions differ on which prevailed after the acquisition.
    yes, pretty much all-around (with a few exceptions). there were some smarter people but they left.”

  72. 72.

    Calouste

    ‘@trollhattan:

    Inflicting a crushing defeat on the last major country to start a war in Europe actually resulted in the longest period without a war there in centuries.

  73. 73.

    WaterGirl

    ‘@Scout211

    I was just about to ask you if you meant to DELETE your earlier comment or if that was a mistake.

  74. 74.

    Scout211

    ‘@WaterGirl

    I liked that delete function so much that I had to take for a spin. LOL

    Really, I needed to start over because the first attempt looked like a confusing mess. It was easier to delete the whole thing and then start over rather than edit, edit, edit.

  75. 75.

    oldgold

    This reminds of the start of the classic television show – “The Outer Limits.”

    “There is nothing wrong with your television set. Do not attempt to adjust the picture. We are controlling transmission. If we wish to make it louder, we will bring up the volume. If we wish to make it softer, we will tune it to a whisper. We will control the horizontal. We will control the vertical. We can roll the image, make it flutter. We can change the focus to a soft blur or sharpen it to crystal clarity. For the next hour sit quietly and we will control all that you see and hear. We repeat: there is nothing wrong with your television set. You are about to participate in a great adventure. You are about to experience the awe and mystery which reaches from the inner mind to… The Outer Limits.”

  77. 77.

    WaterGirl

    Someone wrote to ask how to set your location in the comments before refreshing. Sharing my reply here:

    Clicking the comment date/time stamp works for me.

    I clicked on the date/time stamp on a Betty Cracker COMMENT, then refreshed the page, and it went to the right place, except that it was just one or two lines off. Just scroll down one line or so and the comment you were on is right there.

    That’s how it works on my laptop in Safari.

    I just tried it on my phone, too, and it worked the same way. Lined up on the right comment, just a line or two off.

    Maybe you just didn’t recognize that you were in the right place because you were a line or so off?

  78. 78.

    jackmac

    I like the site’s look today! Simple. Clean. And photos with teasers are a nice touch.

  79. 79.

    Spanky

    “And the balloon guy in the upper right-hand corner isn’t fuzzy anymore.”

    You shaved him?

  80. 80.

    Barbara

    ‘@James Powell — there was a small cruise ship off the cost of Africa where the ship ran into trouble and the crew including the captain took off on all the motorized lifeboats without alerting any of the passengers. When the entertainment crew realized what was happening, they alerted the authorities, marshaled the passengers, passed out the life vests and took them to the safest location to wait for assistance. No one died. The captain felt sorrier for himself for losing his ship than for the passengers he stranded.

  82. 82.

    H.E.Wolf

    Thank you to WaterGirl for upgrading the emergency blog site, and thanks to all the front-pagers who are keeping us well-informed. It’s much appreciated!

  85. 85.

    Urza

    ‘@WaterGirl

    Could we change the default text color from grey on white to something easier on the eyes? It looks even worse on phone.

  87. 87.

    Mike in NC

    Maybe this will be the year when Henry Kissinger finally takes that dirt nap he’s been long overdue for.

  88. 88.

    misterpuff

    ‘@ NotMax

    Those poor Serifs. Can we survive Sans Serif?

    But no matter. Now Witness the Firepower of this fully Armed and Operational Battle Blog!

  90. 90.

    pat

    Thank you WG! What an effort. It looks like this might be the home away from home for quite a while, and I appreciate it very much!!

    I asked how to go back to comments that are referenced.
    Thanks for any info.

  91. 91.

    Ksmiami

    I think we need to create a no fly zone over Ukraine. Fuck Putin’s goons. Do it before he swallows up all of Eastern Europe.

  92. 92.

    raven

    The boss lady was banished me to my old office/bedroom. I went to to funerals and and a birthday karaoke gig and I have a really sore throat and am coughing like mad. I tested negative but everyone says that don’ t mean shit. Artie won’y come in here so I be alone!

  94. 94.

    Carlo Graziani

    Testing, is this thing on? Testing…

    It’s on! Very nice! We could live here for a bit if we had to…

  95. 95.

    Origuy

    I like Dark Mode, but when I hover over a link it turns the same black as the background. Chrome on Windows 10 laptop.

  98. 98.

    Redshift

    ‘@pat I think you just have to maybe search the page in the browser and guess which comment it’s in reply to. None of that fancy reply features here!

  99. 99.

    Old School

    ‘@pat

    You could do a search for the name and potentially find it that way. In your example, searching for “Powell” finds the comment being referenced. Of course, James only having one comment in this thread helps make that easier.

    Occasionally you see someone adding a link to the specific comment, but it certainly isn’t as easy as the main site made it.

  100. 100.

    Carlo Graziani

    Weird. I edited a comment successfully. Then, I think I hit the “back button once too often to come back here, and un-edited the comment. Strangest Undo feature I’ve ever seen.

    Oh! Now it’s back! Sorry, IT hallucination, never mind.

  101. 101.

    NeenerNeener

    Ooooo, I like dark mode! When the OG blog comes back I hope this will be an option.

    And an edit button! Yay!

  102. 102.

    WaterGirl

    ‘@pat

    I see that others saw your question first. On a computer you can search for “carlo” or whatever. i don’t think you have that option on a phone or a tablet. if you do, someone please tell me how!

  103. 103.

    Redshift

    ‘@Calouste:
    “Inflicting a crushing defeat on the last major country to start a war in Europe actually resulted in the longest period without a war there in centuries.”

    This. Weird how everyone arguing for not “humiliating” Russia thinks this is WWI and they’re avoiding it leading to another Hitler, rather than the much more apt WWII parallel.
    If you start a war of aggression, getting your army destroyed because it wasn’t as good as you thought and being pushed back to your own borders shouldn’t be considered be considered the exact amount of humiliation needed to teach the lesson that you shouldn’t do that, not “excessive” humiliation.

  104. 104.

    WaterGirl

    ‘@Urza

    I upgraded to the “pay” version of the theme, hoping it would let me change the size and the color for text in comments. No such luck. I may be able to change the color using CSS but i am not a CSS person so that will take a little bit of time.

  108. 108.

    Redshift

    ‘@pat
    On a desktop browser, it’s usually Ctrl-F (or Command-F on a Mac.) Also Find or “Find in Page” in the Edit menu. For Android, see above.

    No need to feel dumb, it’s one of those things that you may not know until you know that it’s there and have a use for it.

  109. 109.

    Carlo Graziani

    ‘@Redshift: The other deeply annoying thing to me about these “Realist” takes is that none of the people counseling some kind of settlement with Russia seem to have had their TVs tuned to news channels on January 6 2021. We’re supposed to take our foot off that son-of-a bitch’s windpipe now that he’s given us an opportunity to finish him off? Fuck that noise. We pay him back.

  111. 111.

    WaterGirl

    ‘@Old School

    Yep. Ctrl-F on windows, Cmd-F on mac.

    I did not know about the “Find in Page”. I will have to look for that on my iPad and iPhone.

  112. 112.

    Mike in NC

    Just read about another mass shooting with 15 people dead at a Texas school. Also known as “a day ending in Y in America”.

  113. 113.

    WaterGirl

    ‘@Origuy

    In this case, with the raw html in a url visible, there is no need to hover over a link. I would be interested to see what happens when it’s a like that isn’t raw html.

    edit: okay, I added a link in the post up top and hovered over it. I could see the URL just fine. I’m in Safari. What browser/device combo are you using?

  114. 114.

    pat

    So 14 elementary kids and a teacher are shot to death in Texas.

    More guns, less regulation, fewer restrictions, 693 people already dead this year, but omg we can’t have anyone getting rid of the blastocyst growing in their body.

  115. 115.

    glc

    Clicked the crescent moon toggle and the page did indeed flip over to a dark theme, and the sun brought me back.

    Chrome on mac.

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