Coffee plus one of the following (it changes, depending on my whim and ingredient availability):

• Homemade egg bites (egg, sausage or meatless sausage, peppers, onion, spinach, cheese)
• Cereal
• Greek yogurt mixed with a dollop of jam
• Breakfast sandwiches (homemade, prepackaged, or from a local restaurant)
• Biscuits and gravy

And it’s an act of constant, willful effort by yourself and your community.

One neighbor is a rental, they are a large immigrant family and are barely getting along. Property owner lives out of country. Another neighbor thought it would be a fun idea to feed neighborhood stray cats. They wound up creating a very healthy breeding family of raccoons out the run-down garage of the rental. For years their offspring have wreaked havoc in our neighborhood. Every fall I’ve had to call a pest control company to trap the tiny raccoons that are small enough to climb downspouts (the big ones aren’t) and destroy the siding and soffits of my neighbors houses. The cat food guy moved away, I figured out how to occlude the raccoons from my downspouts with ample and unsightly flashing, and along with other neighbors, have built or repaired fencing in in our backyards (mostly because of pets and trespassing neighborhood kids, honestly).
It seems like the raccoon misadventure has finally concluded. I’m now stuck with damaged soffits that squirrels have moved into (on account of a looming walnut tree that lives in a neighbors yard and is so large it overhangs my roof), and a repair estimate that was $5k a year ago, when I had the garage roof redone but wasn’t sure I’d gotten the raccoon problem licked, so I didn’t want to proceed with those repairs. Who knows what it’ll be now. … yay.

You can disable the Outlook addon that nags you about Adobe cloud, btw. Small part of the puzzle, but it helps.

I know. I was just seeing if you would notice. awkward laughter

(But thanks, I was trying to wing the conversion and started off with 3.3ft =1m and then did the numbers meme while my fingers typed gibberish.)

I have an FDM printer (Ender 3 clone) that is mostly 2020 aluminum extrusion as the frame. A few years ago I found some 2020 on sale and built a set of shelves for my wife’s plants out of it. (Now - I know. It’s not the most economical use of materials, but it was the middle of winter, and I didn’t want to go work in the garage. Plus the 2020 was on sale.) It’ll support a slew of plants over a 4-foot span (~1.2m) without any sagging or other concerns. It can be wobbly side to side, but that’s a matter of bracing and connectors.

His detractors don’t get it. The doctors just called him back for his second once a year exam to admire him. Trump is in unbelievably good health.

It’s Trump’s business acumen showing again. He gets his yearly checkups each calendar and each fiscal year.

Saying this is a check up is a cover story. The doctors obviously called him in to consult on a particularly tough case.

Yes, these are jokes. I hope president pudding brain remains cognizant enough to see all he built crumble, see his reputation ruined, his criminal enterprise dismantled, see his children jailed, to realize that he’s going to die before his political and criminal enemies, and that it all unfolds exceedingly quickly. Not all hopes are rational or possible, but I’ll accept any part of the above.

In my community, street racing seems to be the entertainment du jour for people with nothing better to do. I live about a half mile (800m) from a major roadway, and very often am jarred by the noise of people racing full tilt. There are a few people who even have modified their cars to be louder, and you can distinctly pick out the sound of their cars.
I’m a light sleeper, and these people will wake me up in the middle of the night with their ‘shotgun exhausts,’ racing down the street. They kill about 5 people a year. Earlier this year, a street race injured over a dozen people, and killed a kid.

As a result, the city has re-timed the lights so that when traveling at normal speeds, traffic is stopped at every stoplight, which means that most drivers now just wontonly disregard speed limits to beat the light timing and not get trapped in a frustrating cycle where a 2-mile drive down the road takes upwards of 15 minutes instead of 5. This just causes the street racers to race later, when they can run the lights and wake everyone up. Plus the increase in speeding by normal drivers decreases safety on the road.

Both the direct and network effects of their stupidity are pretty significant.
So - yes. Street racers are bad people. They are callous, immature, and both actively and passively endanger other motorists. Also, I’m fucking tired, and my dogs are traumatized.

Baby, I know it.

Europe’s stance on Israel shifts as pro-Gaza protests sweep the continent - The Independent

In a later comment, you refer to this flotilla as a publicity stunt in what appears to be a derisive way. It um appears to be garnering publicity.

We won’t know what the outcome will be for a while yet, but governments are shifting their alignment and listening to citizens in a way that they have not been for the last 2 years. This flotilla is appreciably moving the needle in a way that has not been accomplished before. It ain’t nothin’.

I bought a pair of overalls, a long-sleeved green shirt, and a pair of sunglasses with an attached Luigi hat and mustache.

Not a group outfit, but I get a feeling it’ll be a pretty solid way to gauge people this year.

Life imitates art.
For most writers a good day is when life and the people they meet allow them to channel Truman Capote. Yesterday, those writers got to channel Douglas Adam’s without even trying.

To be fair, I also suggested he might be stupid.

So the person who is lying is Ted Cruz. Or he’s too stupid not to conflate the statements. But it’s likely the former.

I promise if they enlist me, I will be utterly incompetent.

I mean. Choose your own conspiracy.

Coup against democracy. Coup for democracy (unlikely, but hey, who knows when you get that many people with that much power together to talk). Mass firings. Loyalty tests. War against Venezuela. War against Russia? Going to withdraw from the international stage entirely and let China have Taiwan/Russia go full tilt at Ukraine. Gonna invade Greenland. Maybe the U.S. just is planning to fire off all the nukes on October 14th to mark the biggest and only Charlie Kirk Day.

In my community, it seems the local, state, federal government and local utilities are all competing to shut down as much of roads as possible, so there’s always a bunch of weird diversions to traffic. An unfortunate side-effect of underinvestment in infrastructure until the need is absolutely dire.

Because the crews don’t get much work done in the winter, they tend to concentrate all their work on warmer months, which exacerbates the issue.

I remember the routes, too, but you don’t have random road congestion or construction that sometimes necessitates alternative routes? It’s like having a psychic friend that tells you when the most direct route is fucked.

I always tell people the very last thought I had before they ask the question, even if it’s completely random. However, I try to walk the thought process back to get to a point where it’s clear I am listening to them. It’s a bit like a Pinky and the Brain bit, except we’re all smart, just not on the same wavelength.

Well, Israel is a country, not a group of people, nor is it explicitly a religion, despite having an official state religion.

To wit: If criticizing Israel is antisemitism, then is a criticism of Poland seen as anti-catholic? Are criticisms of Somalia seen as anti-Muslim? Denmark/Anti-Lutheran, Thailand/anti-buddhism, Turkey/anti-atheist?
The last one is a bit of a stretch, since Turkey is merely officially secular, and not explicitly atheist, but my point is that for the above named pairings, criticism of the state isn’t considered to be attacks against the religion.

It’s a bit silly to have an exception for just the one country, isn’t it?

It’s fun to be silly and the fediverse has a bit of a “ministry of silly walks” vibe to it. I hope that helps clear things up.