Happy Wednesday all! I’m headed up to Kalamazoo this evening for a family wedding. My cousin’s oldest daughter is getting married on Saturday. Got any fun ideas of what the fuck to do in Kalamazoo?
David Trone wasted a lot of his own money just to fumble
Angela Alsobrooks wins Maryland’s hotly contested U.S. Senate primary
https://www.washingtonpost.com/dc-md-va/2024/05/14/maryland-democratic-senate-primary
More here:
Michael Cohen to continue testimony in Trump’s hush money trial
https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2024/05/14/trump-hush-money-trial-michael-cohen-live-updates
#merica
Louisiana parishioners stop armed teen who entered children’s church service
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/article/2024/may/14/abbeville-louisiana-church-armed-teen
Journalists are awesome. All that legwork!
Revealed: US university lecturer behind far-right Twitter account and publishing house
https://www.theguardian.com/world/article/2024/may/14/far-right-twitter-identity-revealed
Oooh that’s gonna make the racists mad
The latest list of top US baby names has a few surprises
https://www.cnn.com/2024/05/14/us/top-baby-names-2023-cec/index.html
There are so many ways to fix the egregious scalping that goes on here. We should take a note from the EU.
Want to see Taylor Swift’s ‘Eras Tour’ without breaking the bank? Try Europe
https://www.cnn.com/2024/05/14/business/taylor-swift-europe-ticket-prices/index.html
LOL
This is a gift article so I want to hear your name! I got: CH Ochre Court’s Ethereal Sunstone SDO and I like the “Ethereal Sunstone” part of it for sure. 🙂
What would your Westminster show dog name be? Take our quiz to find out.
https://wapo.st/44GAg1v
Have a great day!
…not at all sure about this
…hmmm…maybe opting for a phrase was my mistake?
…but pop-culture-reference has me sounding like a radio show…so…uh…surprise me?
…actually…those sort of work if you squint right?
I’ve only had one dog who’s been AKC registered and I should find his paperwork. He had a string of like 18 names, each one more absurd than the last, but he was commonly known and responded to a very simple name that we gave him. He was a very good dog. Dumb as a post (the inbreeding) but so happy and friendly.
CH J Goofy Hurricane RC was mine.
I’ve been called worse.
You should use that name when making restaurant or hotel reservations. “My last name? Hurricane. Yes, that’s right. H-u-r-r-i-c-a-n-e. And my first name is Goofy. We’ll be a party of six. Perfect, see you on Saturday at 8.”
I hope the bride and groom have hired a full orchestra with a plethora of brass players. If so, you can have them perform “I’ve Got a Gal in Kalamazoo.”
Are you a good singer? You can perform the blonde’s part. There’s still plenty of time to practice.
Closer to home, what the hell did they think would happen?
And super-close to home, my little dinner party last night was a roaring success. I had tons of help because people took pity on me. The physical therapist, who was there with his family, told me the goal was to get me out and walking around with no assistance whatsoever. Oh hell no. My cane and my rollater are two of the most powerful weapons in my arsenal. You think I’m going to try to cross a street around here unaided with the way these idiots drive? No, the cane or the rollater is the way to go.
Biden: If I just act more like Trump when it comes to immigration and trade policy, maybe Republicans will vote for me.
This is exactly the same mistake President Obama made over and over again. Newsflash guys: Republicans will NEVER vote for you. It doesn’t matter if you invade Ukraine and drop a nuke on Gaza. They will still call you a commie piece of shit and vote for Trump.
GCH L’s When In Rome DM
I picked what I think I am which is leans more mischievous, relaxed (lazy) and serious.
GCH Legacy’s Spilled Milk TD, because sure, why not!
I’ve now seen two Cybertrucks out in the wild and it’s still jarring how dumb and ridiculous it looks. Move over, Edsel!
I had to google what a cybertruck was. It looks like a vehicle that would have been used to explore the terrain of other planets in a 1970s-era sci-fi…not “Star Trek” or “Space 1999,” more low-budget than that.
And no matter how dumb it looks in photographs — and you’re dead-on that it looks like a mediocre B-movie prop — it’s downright shocking to see one on the road. It does not look like it belongs, and not at all in a fun futuristic way.
I saw one in the mall and it seemed unfinished and flimsy despite its attempt at being a futuristic tank. It felt like an initial rough draft. Also that metal was gross with fingerprints. The areas around the doors and trunks looked like someone ate fries and didn’t wipe their hands on their shirt before touching the car.
Yeah, the big upside is that even if they look stupid, they’re also incredibly poorly made!
Wait, did I say upside …
The edges don’t even line up.
I can’t find it now but I saw an amazing picture of one with a panel removed and there’s almost no internal infrastructure at all, it looks like a bumper car inside, wires and gears.
I believe it! I doubt the windshield or hood panel can support much snow weight.
We did not discuss this earlier in the week, but once again, the NYT proves to be on Trump’s side.
The New York Times fails to capture the insanity of Trump’s rally
defector.com had a post yesterday (paywalled unfortunately) headlined “If Kevin Roose Was ChatGPT With A Spray-On Beard, Could Anyone Tell?”
The post slammed Times tech reporter Roose for writing a hopelessly positive long piece on ChatGPT’s potential which seemed to lack any input from people outside the AI marketing world.
Badically a Theranos repeat.
It neatly parallels so much of what is wrong with political reporting. The goal is not to cover what is happening, it’s to choose who gets a say and then cover what they say is happening.
I think this approach is so deeply embedded in the mindset of places like the Times that it’s rarely up for debate. It’s literally what reporting is.
The kicker to this long digression is that Roose got his start writing a book about a college semester he spent away from Brown and attending Liberty University, where he met Jerry Falwell and ended up writing a hopelessly credulous account of the place, arguing that there was all kinds of openness and debate, and liberals should try harder to meet in the middle.
And of course Jerry Falwell led to Jerry Falwell Jr., who helped deliver evangelicals to Trump and kept his own expensive wife swapping lifestyle funded by Liberty U under wraps by doubling down on homophobia, sexism, and unbending culture war.
Roose completely missed what was really happening, but as far as he was concerned what mattered was repeating the narrative of the guy at the top. It’s how we get these takes on AI, and how we get the broken political coverage too.
Brown University. Of course. When are they going to kick it out of the Ivy League and sub in RISD? The kids there are so much more intelligent and creative.
Oh, and, because Meg insists, dog name:
GCH Remy’s Madame Grand FTA
I have no idea what any of that means.
GCH means Grand Champion. Then there’s a complicated formula where the dog takes on names of other AKC notable ancestors, and then the dog somewhere gets their own name. Should that dog have a litter (and they would, because AKC dogs are disqualified if they are tampered with, and the owners breed, show, and sell the offspring) that name might get incorporated just to prolong the nuttiness.
I advise you all to view “Best in Show.” I’ve been reliably told that the reality is two or three times as bizarre as the parody presents. I’ve been to Westminster many times, when it was at MSG and everyone stayed at the Hotel Pennsylvania next door. A few of my friends have mothers or aunts who breed and show and judge, and they are batshit crazy.
There’s a book called The Orchid Thief that’s largely about the orchid breeders in South Florida, who are also batshit crazy. Full disclosure: I worked for about 8 months with John LaRoche, the orchid thief of the title, which is why I read the book. The book was adapted very poorly into a crappy movie called Adaptation, which nonetheless managed to win an Oscar for Chris Cooper, who played LaRoche.
But it sounds like orchid breeders and dog breeders are similarly insane, have lots of money, and spend most of their time trying to discredit their competitors.
That’s a great book. I’m curious what you thought of LaRoche.
I liked Adaptation too, which was a meta joke about how completely unadaptable the book is. But I’ll also admit it’s not really a movie and if the pieces fall flat to someone the whole thing would be painful. It’s a cousin to Being John Malkovich and Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind, and I’d definitely say it’s a good bit below them.
LaRoche was one of the few true geniuses I’ve ever met. And by that I mean he grasped new concepts almost instantly and would do things like teach himself Javascript over a weekend. He actually did web building for an advertising company I worked for. He used to talk to me and ask me to define words I used, so he could improve his vocabulary. Then he’d use them.
He was very black/white (I suspect he was on the spectrum). Once the orchid thing blew up in his face, he refused to talk or discuss orchids any more in any context. A group of us went to lunch once and I saw him looking at an orchid in a restaurant and asked him what kind it was. He told me flatly “I don’t talk about that any more” and that was it.
There were a couple of true tragedies about John. One was that he was born to a very low-income family that couldn’t give him the opportunities he needed. The other was that for someone who was so intelligent he was surprisingly naive. He was told he’d make millions by allowing his name to be used in Adaptation. Of course, he made absolutely nothing. He did get to go to the premier party. I would have loved to have seen that.
I also don’t agree with the screenwriter that The Orchid Thief was unadaptable. I’m pretty sure you could get a great story out of the various machinations of orchid breeders.
Wasn’t the guy that Clint Eastwood played in some movie (I think it was called “The Mule”) an orchid breeder?
He came across as an extremely astute person in the book.
I guess a better way to put unadaptable would be Orchid Thief wasn’t a book you could do as a straight Hollywood movie. There wasn’t any romance or violence, and orchids themselves don’t do anything, they just sit there, instead of exploding. It would definitely work as a documentary or indy movie.
You’d definitely have to overlay a plot on it, but that’s no worse than what Kaufman (was that his name?) actually did. You could have rival orchid breeders fighting, scheming to have this guy steal ghost orchids, and just insert other crimes like murder. Then even have the orchid thief turn the tables on the breeders. Hollywood has made more with less to start with.
Best in Show is a delightful movie.
What Do Actual Dog Handlers Think of “Best in Show”? An Investigation
My family used to be involved in Arabian horse shows. The names are just as nonsensical.
I chose mischievous and silly
CH Nelson’s Mad As A Hatter MC
GCH E’s Carmine Obsidian TD
NOOOO, not Maggie!
https://www.politicususa.com/2024/05/14/maggie-haberman-trump-trial.html
How did the kicker get this much head trauma?
https://apnews.com/article/kansas-city-chiefs-harrison-butker-e00f6ee45955c99ef1e809ec447239e0
Now I understand!
Holy shit, we knew Haberman was compromised, but hell, she was basically on Trump’s staff.
And it basically goes without saying, but that explains a LOT about why the NYT glosses over Trump’s stupefying long list of faults and problems.
Apparently I have canine issues.
CH K’s The Man In The Iron Mask FTA
Parvo, maybe?
RE: Kalamazoo — Bell’s Brewery is certainly worth a taste.
https://bellsbeer.com/history/
Two Hearted IPA is really good.
GCH Jolly Valley’s Exact Castle In The Sky TD
sure…ill go with that
i love the postal system over here….ordered 2034 last night from a dutch store….it arrived a couple hours ago….. from france….im equal parts baffled that it came from france….and impressed it made it to my doorstep in under 24 hours
GHC Queen’s Effervescent FTA.