A New York Times Book Review Editors' Choice and a January 2020 IndieNext Pick. An Amazon Best Book of January. One of Vogue's 22 Books to Read This Winter, The Washington Post's 10 Books to Read in January, ELLE's 12 Best Books to Read in 2020, The New York Times's 12 Books to Read in January, Esquire's 15 Best Winter Books
Saturday, October 31, 2020
Picked up from my wishlist, Anna Wiener's Uncanny Valley is $2.99
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John
at
9:42 PM
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Dame Lillard as Stone Cold Steve Austin; Vending machine dispenses tricks and treats; Free Curses tear-off flyer
When @Dame_Lillard dressed up as Stone Cold 🍻
— Bleacher Report (@BleacherReport) October 31, 2020
(via @trailblazers) pic.twitter.com/kMbnMHxpvO
Has everyone seen this amazing thing in carlton? It’s a vending machine called Kevin. You pay five bucks for a piece of paper linked to a local business, go to that business, say trick or treat and be rewarded with a trick or a treat and they are EXCELLENT. pic.twitter.com/bR1Sb9hi3e
— Lorinimus (@Lorinimus) October 31, 2020
In other news my mom is a seagull egg for Halloween pic.twitter.com/bPm0vPZ7xe
— kisima inŋitchuŋa✨🎃 (@qapvik_isuma) October 31, 2020
Parent(s) of the year #Zardoz #Halloween pic.twitter.com/9brQQHl125
— Phil Szostak (@PhilSzostak) November 3, 2017
ms paint hehe geddit pic.twitter.com/18ULMXMbvB
— Zee ☀️ STAY 2M AWAY FROM ME (@zeekayart) October 25, 2020
I’m making this year’s Halloween costumes. Not sure how I’m going to top last year but I’M GOING TO TRY. https://t.co/87XuN9i4ZP pic.twitter.com/71hs0tlDg0
— Miss Potkin (@MissPotkin) October 8, 2020
He BODIED this @AndreAgassi costume 🙌🎾 [📸: https://t.co/far21avOBd] pic.twitter.com/SuyLUFgVi3
— SoleCollector.com (@SoleCollector) October 31, 2020
When you’re loading pic.twitter.com/2Bk8J9XQIL
— Tony Lin (@tony_zy) October 31, 2020
“the woman who’s having her bang cut but the hairdresser is nowhere to be found” pic.twitter.com/YOSUqjaGlv
— Tony Lin (@tony_zy) October 31, 2020
"Man walking into the wind"https://t.co/2UMsaYyvKX
— Nick Kapur (@nick_kapur) October 31, 2020
"Man whose photo was accidentally taken by the Google Street View car"https://t.co/rIl2JwkkfM
— Nick Kapur (@nick_kapur) October 31, 2020
Channeling my inner Julian Karswell and getting into the Halloween spirit. pic.twitter.com/ivrWMEEI8u
— alexander miles 🎨 (@_AlexanderMiles) October 31, 2020
*More Halloween links.
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John
at
6:23 PM
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Labels: flyer, funny, halloween, vending machine
From 1999, David Carr writes about Ruth Shalit (author of that now infamous feature in the Atlantic)
David Carr's extremely lengthy article for the Washington City Paper:
It’s hard to remember that at a time when being a hot young writer in Washington was a big deal, Shalit was the biggest deal of all. As a featured writer in the opinion journal the New Republic beginning in 1993, she was a gorgeous stylist, with a gift for rendering the distant cousins of literary detail and policy nuance, often separated by nothing more than a comma. By the time she was 24, contracts, assignments, and bouquets were arriving steadily from some of the most reliable brand names in the business: the New York Times Magazine, GQ, and the New York Observer, among others. Her first real job out of college made her famous and well-compensated in a business not known for either.
Somewhere amidst all the buzz and sizzle, Shalit made the quintessentially ’90s journey from media employee to media celebrity.
...
In Shalit’s version of things, she left Washington because she finally decided to walk away from all of the hectoring windbags who would lay her low. She exited the New Republic at the end of January, but her departure actually came after months of quiet pushing from Editor Charles Lane. Either way, Shalit is no longer a Washington journalist because she could not change the single most interesting thing about herself:
“People fall prey to a reductionist fallacy that the worst truth about you is the most consequential truth. [The plagiarism] was a truth about me and is a truth about me. But there are a lot of other interesting truths as well.”
...
As the covered and the coverers reached a new level of intimacy, stars like Shalit began serving as subjects, rather than authors, of extensive profiles for the likes of George magazine. And, like those politicians who are handed gobs of power and adulation for no particular reason, Shalit became unaccountable. Her editorial enablers chose not to notice that their cherished phenom had not mastered the basics of her profession.
Another reminiscence:
One day I called the New Republic, just to see if she was a real person. She picked up - this is when people had desk phones and used them - and was confused about why I was talking to her.
— Peter Kafka (@pkafka) October 31, 2020
Posted by
John
at
11:52 AM
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"Biden Team Cancels Texas Event After Highway 'Ambush' by MAGA Cavalry"
TDB:
A Biden campaign staffer told The Daily Beast that Trump supporters surrounded the bus on the highway and slowed down in front of it, attempting to stop it or run it off the road. The official sent a picture taken on the bus, showing Trump trucks surrounding the front of the vehicle. Staffers on the bus called police, who helped the bus reach its destination.
Video from the highway shows trucks surrounding the bus, at one point colliding with an SUV.
I flew down to Texas to help with the Biden/Harris bus tour, intended to drum up enthusiasm at polling locations. Instead, I ended up spending the afternoon calling 911. 1/ pic.twitter.com/gKAjv7gv85
— Dr. Eric Cervini (@ericcervini) October 31, 2020
This is a traffic violation and attempted homicide. Why hasn’t anyone been arrested? pic.twitter.com/QnfF4vXMQn
— haunting student debt owners (@mcbyrne) October 31, 2020
While harassing the Biden bus in Texas yesterday, the Trump convoy included a HEARSE. This image really sums up the two campaigns. pic.twitter.com/1qMNgi65nl
— Brandon Friedman (@BFriedmanDC) October 31, 2020
This is a 1st for me - but we just cancelled a joint event in Pflugerville w/ @JoeBiden campaign, @AustinYoungDems, & more, due to security reasons. Unfortunately, Pro-Trump Protestors have escalated well beyond safe limits. Sorry to all who looked forward to this fun event. https://t.co/tSq4moqro0
— Sheryl Cole (@SherylCole1) October 30, 2020
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John
at
11:30 AM
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Labels: trump
An attorney that's been deemed a “vexatious litigant” in state court and federal court seems likely to win an election for judge
Austin Chronicle this week:
In January, barring some unexpected obstacle, Madeleine Connor will become judge in the 353rd state District Court. Following previous defeats as a Republican (twice) and a Democrat (once), Connor narrowly defeated incumbent Judge Tim Sulak in the March Democratic primary.
She has no Republican opponent in November.
Statesman from last Spring:
Sulak, in his 10th year on the bench, is well-regarded in courthouse circles. A survey of local attorneys last year showed him with the highest score for overall excellence among the county’s eight civil district judges.
...
“Having all of these experiences, I think I would make an excellent judge,” [Connor] said.
Posted by
John
at
9:06 AM
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Labels: law
Today's funny posts
(I've been assembling these collections from Twitter for years now, and I've always had so many collected that I've scheduled the posts days ahead of time. This is the first time I ran out of Tweets. Not sure if that says something about my feed specifically, or reflects Twitter's mood before the election, or an exodus to Tiktok.)
it's like answering the question "how would Michael Jordan have competed in LeBron's NBA"
— Ranjan (@ranjanxroy) October 30, 2020
I love that the Melania body double theory is rooted about 30% in the fact that the person in the video doesn’t look like Melania and 70% in America’s collective confidence that the President’s wife doesn’t love him.
— VOTEfamous🗳 (@renfamous) October 31, 2020
I've been yelled at by no fewer than all of my editors for doing this
— sarah emerson (@SarahNEmerson) October 29, 2020
Four years ago this week: My favorite Yao Ming photo. Playing golf with @garyplayer. pic.twitter.com/g9k10sdy12
— Darren Rovell (@darrenrovell) October 30, 2020
Snacksalot McFluffins pic.twitter.com/jVyjEBtZiY
— Oregoth Boo (@OregonZoo) October 29, 2020
A young Disneyland visitor meets Maleficent.
Dog loves cuddlign with the baby.
Retired horse and rescued greyhound.
The fence won't kepp the new neighbors apart.
Bird and dogs are partners in crime.
Rescued beaver has progressed to gathering sticks.
*More funny posts.
Posted by
John
at
9:00 AM
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Labels: funny
The Marshall's podracer engine jetbike from The Mandalorian
Posted by
John
at
8:56 AM
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Labels: mandalorian, star wars
The Atlantic revealed they not only published an author with a "plagiarism and inaccurate reporting" scandal in her background, but allowed her to modify her name
The Atlantic has posted an in progress correction that's already 12 paragraphs long to its big article on wealthy families and student athletes. Lots of discussion of specific anecdotes in the article looking to be falsehoods or exaggerations, and this revelation about the author:
We are also updating Barrett’s byline. Originally, we referred to her as Ruth S. Barrett. When writing recently for other magazines, Barrett was identified by her full name, Ruth Shalit Barrett. (Barrett is her married name.) In 1999, when she was known by Ruth Shalit, she left The New Republic, where she was an associate editor, after plagiarism and inaccurate reporting were discovered in her work. We typically defer to authors on how their byline appears—some authors use middle initials, for example, or shorter versions of their given name. We referred to Barrett as Ruth S. Barrett at her request, but in the interest of transparency, we should have included the name that she used as her byline in the 1990s, when the plagiarism incidents occurred. We have changed the byline on this article to Ruth Shalit Barrett.
We decided to assign Barrett this freelance story in part because more than two decades separated her from her journalistic malpractice at The New Republic and because in recent years her work has appeared in reputable magazines. We took into consideration the argument that Barrett deserved a second chance to write feature stories such as this one. We were wrong to make this assignment, however. It reflects poor judgment on our part, and we regret our decision.
ideally this should involve having raised one of the daughters *as a son* since childhood, after a careful reading of the college sports admissions statistics discovered that the odds with the male squash team were better https://t.co/kVQ5wHs0hl
— James Palmer (@BeijingPalmer) October 31, 2020
Posted by
John
at
8:41 AM
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Labels: scandals
Sexy Lakitu (with gun) costume; Minecraft tower with kaleidoscopic falling experience; Splatterhouse paper masks
This Friday I'm showing a piece in @TheSubstation_'s latest edition of PLATFORM
— Kalonica (@Kalonica_) October 28, 2020
🟪🟧🟩🎆🌆🎆🟩🟧🟪
Minecraft exhibition + live music
Register here to attend in-game or watch the stream on youtube: https://t.co/tMxf0RumJw pic.twitter.com/V4qdqz6T3A
For tonight's PLATFORM exhibition in Minecraft, I built a very tall tower housing a kaleidoscopic falling e x p e r i e n c e ~
— Kalonica (@Kalonica_) October 30, 2020
✨🟨🟦🟩🟥🟪🟧✨
Music: Chiara Kickdrum
TW: video contains flickering images pic.twitter.com/revT48XjpJ
There’s no better game to celebrate Halloween with than #Splatterhouse for the TurboGrafx-16, so we dug up some vintage Splatterhouse Halloween promotional items, including this scary pop-out masks! #nvmusa pic.twitter.com/GcqOb06Ajl
— National Videogame Museum (@nvmusa) October 27, 2020
"Kingpin, the last boss of the Punisher arcade game, was originally so big that he filled half the screen, but Marvel told us 'he's a regular human, he can't be /that/ big' and made us change it" https://t.co/mxjYkNCcAr
— GSK | https://secure.actblue.com/donate/ab_mn (@gosokkyu) October 29, 2020
Here's CD Projekt Red co-CEO Adam Kiciński talking to investors about crunch yesterday (left) and him apologizing to his employees for those comments today in an email obtained by Bloomberg News (right). Quite a turnaround pic.twitter.com/YaYNtPDphY
— Jason Schreier (@jasonschreier) October 29, 2020
Apologies to every level designer who was told stuff like this was too on the nose https://t.co/zMaPGjR7e2
— Kat Nicole B (@KatNicoleB) October 30, 2020
Waluigi Wikipedia article edited anonymously from [US] U. S. Bureau of the Census https://t.co/uDLh1i5Bq2
— The fifth estate (@5thEstateWiki) October 30, 2020
Posted by
John
at
7:30 AM
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Labels: cosplay, mario, memes, minecraft, spider-man, video games
This week's best wargaming miniatures
Kyria Draxus finished! I made 9 tutorials about painting this miniature for https://t.co/s63kUBGiw1 and in the next Wednesday I will upload the last one, about painting the gun and a few last details :) #warmongers #wipwednesday #warhammercommunity #PaintingWarhammer #40k pic.twitter.com/cj3UrX1BS9
— Flameon Miniatures (@FlameMiniatures) October 7, 2020
Okay, this improved my monday :D pic.twitter.com/g5GUIXBkot
— Comrade Vasiljevic (@PVasiljevic) October 12, 2020
I recently painted up a bunch of Batman models for a board game commission, #Batman: Gotham City Chronicles. I thought I'd start things off right by posting #Batcow!@Monolithedition #boardgame #boardgames #miniatures #Miniature #miniaturepainting #dccomics @DCComics pic.twitter.com/hr5152gq5K
— Todd McNeal (@ToadPainter) October 9, 2020
Starship Samurai | Board Game #StarshipSamurai #boardgames #boardgamegeek #bggcommunity #bgg #boardgames #boardgame #boardgamer #boardgamenight #boardgameday #starshipsamurai #plaidhatgames #nerds pic.twitter.com/0Zfyaly4XQ
— Den of Imagination (@doiStudio) October 7, 2020
Peter Cushing works on one of his amazing miniature stage models in 1963 pic.twitter.com/EOLvlhHnDC
— Hammer Horror Films (@HorrorHammer1) October 14, 2020
Modelers understand pic.twitter.com/s3CD1iLwQM
— Frank (still not ready to move on) (@AdsoMenk) October 14, 2020
*See more miniatures.
Posted by
John
at
6:00 AM
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Labels: games workshop, miniatures, warhammer, warhammer 40k
Friday, October 30, 2020
"The D.C. National Guard and Pentagon IG are fighting over who to blame" for the helicopters that menaced protesters in Washington D.C.
Two D.C. National Guard helicopters that flew low over protesters in Washington, D.C., on the night of June 1 were not properly authorized to be there — and were directed by a lieutenant colonel who was far from the scene, driving home in his car, according to an initial investigation by the D.C. National Guard.
The superior officer who authorized the deployment claimed he didn’t know that the regulations required him to have higher-level approval to use the helicopters at all, and that in any case, he in no way told the lieutenant colonel that the helicopters should be used for crowd dispersal.
Now the D.C. National Guard and the Defense Department Inspector General’s office appear to be at odds over who should take responsibility for the incident
The man that seems most targeted for blame is named "Wingblade."
WaPo:
The National Guard Bureau has established a new unit made up mostly of military policemen that could be dispatched to help quell unrest in coming days, after a turbulent summer in which National Guard members were deployed to several cities.
The unit, which also could be used to respond to natural disasters and other missions, was formed in September and initially described as a rapid-reaction force. But as one of the most divisive elections in American history closes in, National Guard officials have softened how they characterize the service members, instead referring to them as “regional response units."
A National Guard official, speaking on the condition of anonymity because of the sensitivity of the issue, said the new name more accurately details their mission. But the shift away from language used in war also hints at the complicated situation the National Guard could face, as President Trump signals that he might not accept the results of the election if he loses.
Posted by
John
at
6:59 PM
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Labels: military
High school journalists at duPont Manual High School in Louisville revealed that the Kentucky State Police training materials repeatedly quoted Hitler
A training slideshow used by the Kentucky State Police (KSP) — the second largest police force in the state — urges cadets to be “ruthless killer[s]” and quotes Adolf Hitler advocating violence.
The slideshow was included in KSP documents obtained via an open records request by [a] local attorney ... during the discovery phase of a lawsuit. [The attorney] requested KSP materials used to train a detective who shot and killed a man in Harlan County, and [the attorney] shared the presentation with Manual RedEye.
A line from Adolf Hitler’s fascist and anti-Semitic manifesto, Mein Kampf, is featured in the slide: “the very first essential for success is a perpetually constant and regular employment of violence.”
The presentation also links to a Hitler page on Goodreads, a database of quotes and books.
Two other slides quoting Hitler bring his total to three, making him the most quoted person in the presentation.
There's other troubling content, but the police say it's not clear when the materials were last used. The reporters are related to a partner in the firm involved in the lawsuit.
Gov. Andy Beshear reacted to a report Friday showing a Kentucky State Police training slideshow quoting Adolf Hitler three times and advocating officers to use "ruthless" violence, calling it "unacceptable."
...
"This is absolutely unacceptable," said Beshear in an emailed statement. "It is further unacceptable that I just learned about this through social media. We will collect all the facts and take immediate corrective action."
Posted by
John
at
6:31 PM
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Labels: police
The Toy Story Sid deluxe figure includes toys to torture
20 Points of articulation3 Face plates4 Pairs of handsScud dog figure (2 replaceable heads)Mini Buzz Lightyear tied to a rocket (rocket can be disassembled)Magnifying glassThree-eyed Aliens
Posted by
John
at
9:49 AM
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Today's funny posts
Roborace is the world first driver-less/autonomous motorsports category.
— Ryan (@dogryan100) October 29, 2020
This is one of their first live-broadcasted events.
This was the second run.
It drove straight into a wall. pic.twitter.com/ss5R2YVRi3
Everything is terrible. Here's a football match last weekend that was ruined after the AI cameraman kept mistaking the linesman's bald head for a football.https://t.co/BsoQFqEHu0 pic.twitter.com/GC9z9L8wHf
— James Felton (@JimMFelton) October 29, 2020
The Trump administration was vetting celebrities for a $250 million (taxpayer-funded) advertising campaign and please read why some didn't make the cut https://t.co/jyGiAwWBht pic.twitter.com/yULJXcT35h
— philip lewis (@Phil_Lewis_) October 29, 2020
A Trump campaign committee’s celebrity supporter recruitment tracker document obtained by @politico lists Ronday Rousey as having been arrested during a WWE event in ‘19.
— Ryan Satin (@ryansatin) October 29, 2020
😂😂😂 https://t.co/InPLK8yPby pic.twitter.com/CtD3fW5Zlc
Imagine if we only knew about beavers from fossil remains. We would 100% reconstruct them wrong. Now apply this to dinosaurs. We are almost certainly not making dinosaurs weird enough. https://t.co/ZCFNDl4DTt
— Ethan “Fright Night FOR REAL” Kocak (@Blackmudpuppy) October 29, 2020
it never fails to amaze me how writers will find a way to remove a woman’s hijab, my god.
— SanAHHHHHHH! REAL MONSTERS Saeed (@SanaSaeed) October 29, 2020
pic.twitter.com/qz414mrmtV
I put a small seasonal arrangement on the table and the dog decided to add a green ball. pic.twitter.com/LFVcynScES
— Jules (@kind_but_bolshy) October 29, 2020
An actual picture of Schrodinger‘s cat pic.twitter.com/2OOXJ09Mxh
— unix-ninja (@unix_ninja) October 28, 2020
How did you get this through the cat flap raffy
— Katie (@ZiziFothSi) October 28, 2020
Also are you the king of England now pic.twitter.com/bE6Uf2Rw08
Quick learner of the day. pic.twitter.com/WCzXiX7tfL
— Dick King-Smith HQ (@DickKingSmith) October 28, 2020
Reggie is the chillest pic.twitter.com/vCwkCt30jD
— Kate Beaton (@beatonna) October 28, 2020
A good big bro pic.twitter.com/H16PdAwpXR
— Kate Beaton (@beatonna) October 28, 2020
*More funny posts.
Posted by
John
at
9:00 AM
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The tiniest McDonald's; Star Wars Holiday Special custom figures; Shockwave helmet
the smallest mcdonald's - "mchive" (2019)
— nonstandard mcdonald's (@nonstandardmcd) October 29, 2020
originally constructed in sweden; current location unknown
active (for bees only; inaccessible to humans)
submission by byron kan pic.twitter.com/WYH9HPQ2rU
"but isn't it easier to build an entire house?" -someone probably
— Todd Vaziri (@tvaziri) October 27, 2020
The scary visual effects behind "The Haunting of Bly Manor"https://t.co/4aLeors79H pic.twitter.com/ya5OOPSaXA
wear the mask 🎭 ig: snitchery pic.twitter.com/z9iWbunyru
— eleanor (@snitchery) October 26, 2020
Once again my fav is the exhausted old man 🦑 #hbowatchmen pic.twitter.com/aOm3j3cZMC
— Amelia Lola罗 (@machodoodle) October 28, 2020
Beck Variant for #StrangerThings #DungeonsandDragons 2 @DarkHorseComics #QX pic.twitter.com/7HfE7hebJS
— Quixotic Comics (@QuixoticComics) October 28, 2020
THIS IS SO DOPE@DeadlyMike Variant for Fantastic Four Road Trip #1!#QX pic.twitter.com/YUngz1Dqe8
— Quixotic Comics (@QuixoticComics) October 29, 2020
Starting to paint up my holiday special Boba Fett! Here's my progress with my holiday special C3PO and R2!#actionfiguretoronto #bobafett #starwars #starwarsholidayspecial #r2d2 #c3po https://t.co/taQFntnHsT pic.twitter.com/0vwnTaVhMD
— Action Figure Toronto (@ActionFigureTO) October 29, 2020
Transformer's Shockwave helmet with "eye" that lights up when talking by BMB cosplay (FB: https://t.co/qoBEIuDx1I). #Transformers #Prop #CraftYourFandom pic.twitter.com/f4HUtczNi7
— the RPF (@therpf) October 29, 2020
Posted by
John
at
6:00 AM
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Labels: comic book covers, custom toys, mcdonald's, transformers