Huh ... must be divine punishment for all the ICE sins that went down in Minnesota.

The Ambre is not terrible in price, but that's a really good house. I used to buy it. Probably still could if I went to Kentucky. Yep - still about $50. Very close to an XO but much cheaper.

Canada in second place? Who ever complied that list has not travelled public transit in Edmonton in the past five years. Edit. I see now that it is about technical safety standards.

Sad. Obviously, government acceptance (and probably cooperation) in places like Laos. Like in teh picture above, having this big casino and random office blocks in the middle of what is basically jungle makes no "rational" sense. Obviously something bad is going on there, yet, the police are bought off, etc. As the article says, (in so many words), "the workers are relatively free to move around, because there is no place for them to go, and if they do leave the compound, the police would quickly track them down."

Seems fair enough. If the seat could have been filled by a paying passenger I see no justification for a refund.

Light weight.

Link to video Classical at its core, pleasantly and accessibly intellectual in its approach, retro and fresh at the same time. If you want original classical-sounding chamber music that (1) is not boring, not too predictable, and (2) won't leave you questioning WTF has contemporary classical music become, this fits the bill. The composer is still living.

https://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2026/01/tiktok-claimed-bugs-blocked-anti-ice-videos-epstein-mentions-experts-call-bs/ TikTok wants users to believe that errors blocking uploads of anti-ICE videos or direct messages mentioning Jeffrey Epstein are due to technical errors—not the platform seemingly shifting to censor content critical of Donald Trump after he hand-picked the US owners who took over the app last week. However, experts say that TikTok users’ censorship fears are justified, whether the bugs are to blame or not. Ioana Literat, an associate professor of technology, media, and learning at Teachers College, Columbia University, has studied TikTok’s politics since the app first shot to popularity in the US in 2018. She told Ars that “users’ fears are absolutely justified” and explained why the “bugs” explanation is “insufficient.”

@jon-nyc I think it was somewhat calculated. President Trump has no filter and whatever he thinks, he posts. I dont believe that VP Vance is the same. More like President Obama, where everything is carefully thought out before saying anything. Very little "off the cuff" stuff.

I did not either. Saw something similar on high priced Italian purses. Something like 95% is made in China, and then they do the final sowing of the zipper in Italy and attach the label. That is considered sufficient manufacturing so that they can call it "made in Italy"

@Axtremus Paying for access and favorable treatment in the future.Same reason that the president of Apple was at the screening at the White House. Do you plan on seeing it in the movie theatre? 555

@blondie Me too. I probably shouldn't bring back old forum threads. LOL

@Doctor-Phibes said in My mental divorce from American football: @Mik said in My mental divorce from American football: Communist. It's just nice to see Jon refer to it 'American Football'. Maybe next summer he'll start watching cricket. I don’t recall ever watching an American football game on the TV. Rarely watched a CFL game either in the past 20 or so years - despite it being a noticeably different game from the US game of four downs and smaller gridiron. Hockey (depending who’s playing), curling and “football” for me, thank you.

@Mik I do recall some controversy about Gen. Milley in fact not all that long ago….but I am quite sure it was just idle gossip of no consequence outside a small circle of friends.

I bought a bunch under 2k also. I have sold some. Maybe I have 135oz left or something like that.

@Klaus said in Today’s fresh hell from academia: Surely none of you made up their minds … About what?

@89th said in Winter Storm 2026 Memes: LOL that is great. Yeah lots of folks in Northern Virginia are dealing with a thick coat of ice on top of it all. After a day or two, that becomes like concrete if temps stay low. AMIRIT @lufins-dad ? Oh yeah. Got to the showroom today to discover that much of our front walkway is only getting cleared with a sledgehammer.

So how long did it take before they started using it for porn? 72 hours?

It’s basically true in the English colonies. Not so much in the Spanish. It basically came down to whether the local tribesmen were more hunter-gatherer or agricultural. By the way, by and large the hunter-gatherer tribes were wiped out and the agricultural societies were functionally enslaved or at least systematically exploited. I used to think that was primarily an English vs Spanish thing but it again had to do with the development state of the local tribesmen. Hunter gathers in the pampas were wiped out just like the North American ones.