Ross

Kraft Macaroni and Cheese. Original flavor, not that any of the other flavors are that much different. The canonical example of mid food, but I love it. I've probably eaten close to a thousand boxes of the stuff in my lifetime.

Way down near the bottom of the article: "It was not clear what advantages the U.S. government portal would offer users that are not available from commercial VPNs." ...which is the part I was wondering about.

I feel like there's story potential in combining "vast fleets" of AI datacenter satellites with Pournelle's fantasy of orbital crowbar kinetic weapons with Skynet. Something something malevolent AIs de-orbit themselves onto cities to destroy civilization, hijinks ensue.

"Don't worry, we've already harvested enough information about you to figure out your age" is not the reassuring statement they seem to think it is.

If somebody ran for president with the same level of genuine enthusiasm and fun that Mamdani has, they would sweep fifty states.

This series is fantastic. "We live in a post-apocalyptic dystopia ruled by corporations and tech bros; let's build community and fight fascism and have hot sex about it."

New compromise: ICE agents MUST wear masks at all times, that cover their entire face including their eyes and are 100% opaque from the inside.

Dear Lord we have *got* to start lining up people for the Dem primaries who are not this fucking pathetic.

I saw that movie at a special screening in Ankrhan-Annatis, the howling abyss before time began, where yet-unnamed gods huddle with each other against the cold winds of pre-being. 4/5 stars.

The ocean freighting industry is woke now (the containers spell Renee, for Renee Good). www.reddit.com/r/Tacoma/com...

I see some people are talking about "reforming" or "retraining" ICE. In the spirit of helpfulness, here are my suggestions: Reforming: Update the ICE agent job description to, "This page intentionally left blank." Retraining: Unemployment.

Generalize your skeets. What's your most typical, most average skeet? Skeet: [anecdote from my life that relates vaguely to the skeet I'm responding to] Brain, 30 seconds later: OMG that was so cringe why did I do that

But if you spent time workshopping it you might not be able to jump to, "You're not providing adequate health care so the United States of America is stepping in" in the next breath.

"Grok, role-play the computer from War Games."

Dang.

To the "If she'd obeyed orders she wouldn't have been shot!" assholes: You're telling me that here in the land of the free and the home of the brave, if an agent of the government gives you an order, your only choices are instant obedience or death? That's the country you want to live in?

I suspect that appetite for trying to do selected parts of the Silmarillion has declined since Rings of Power was received with the enthusiasm usually reserved for a damp paper towel. But that wasn't a problem with the source material, it was a problem with not knowing what the hell they were doing.

"But Maduro was a dictator, they should be glad he's gone." If, say, China suddenly sent troops into Washington DC and abducted Trump to stand trial in China, on the grounds that he was an evil dictator, and then installed a "temporary" puppet government, I would feel two emotions at the same time.

I stopped using Twitter when Musk took over. But it was just recently that I actually deactivated my account. I should have done it sooner.

When I lived by myself I used the True Neutral setup, now that I'm married we have Lawful Good.

This may be too minor to count, but I was once in a community theater production with a guy who had just had a one-episode bit part on Northern Exposure where he was onscreen for like one minute playing a mechanic servicing Maggie's plane. But it's enough to give me a Bacon number of 4.

How I'm walking out of 2025:

The enemy of my enemy may be strategically useful in certain specific scenarios, but that is a long, long way from being my friend.

Shout out to the person in the replies arguing that the robot is "showing empathy" rather than simply following the guy's movements with about a half-second delay.

I came of age in the Reagan years. My first presidential vote was for Michael Dukakis. At least it lets me see how Trump is just the final evolution of Reagan.

The #1 movie when you were 10 years old is how your 2026 is going to go. Sounds about right.

"you're a man" ad hominem "you were born a boy" sunk cost fallacy "you're amab" false dichotomy "you have xy chromosomes" false equivalence "trans people are mentally ill" non sequitur "changing your sex isn't possible" skill issue

I have heard that it's not uncommon for popular authors to get letters like, "I have this amazing idea for a book; you can write it up and we'll split the money 50/50." As though the process of transforming an idea into a book's worth of words is just the tedious aftermath of having the idea.

In unrelated news, Acme School Supplies reports an order for 10,000 rulers to be delivered to Texas.

Grave of the Fireflies. An amazing piece of art, but on the whole I prefer not having my heart pulled from my chest and put through a blender.

Movie you’ve watched more than six times with a Movie you’ve watched more than six times with a gif. Hard mode: no Stars (Wars nor Trek), LOTR, or Marvel, Disney Animated or Pixar.

I feel like the people who thought, "Yeah, a camera that takes pictures of my poop and sends it over the internet to be inspected by strangers sounds like a great idea, sign me up," are perhaps not totally concerned about their privacy.

So... their plan was to swim to the US? And this constituted an imminent danger?

Unpausable cutscenes. Or dialog. Or anything.