Thanks to the absolute madness that is Daylight Saving Time, I get a week of cat anger as they adapt to the time change, but I'm not in a panic yet... because an all new Bullet Sunday starts... now...

   
• NEWSFLASH: Lay’s Rebrands Because Customers Apparently Didn’t Know Chips Were Made With ‘Real Potatoes’. Because of course. They haven't had "Potato Chips" on the package since 2007... and I guess those potatoes on the package aren't a big enough clue. That being said, the Lay's rebrand is gorgeous. Kinda. The new logo typeface looks fresh while honoring what came before. The banner is so much better, looking like a design element instead of a weird merging with the sun(?) behind it. And, yep, it IS a sun, because now they have nice rays behind it. Perfect. And I love the wood table look of the background...

BUT THEN... they just take random photo elements and glop everything to the logo unit? What a mess...

AND COULDN'T THEY HAVE STAGGERED THE POTATOES A LITTLE BIT??? OR RE-THINK THE PHOTO ELEMENTS COMPLETELY? WHAT DESIGNER JUST STICKS EVERYTHING TO THE LOGO LIKE IT'S A GAME OF KATAMARI DAMACY??? ACK! ACK! ACK!

Lay's created a gorgeous new logo then sabotaged it utterly. Those chips don't even look like chips (they look more like Pringles) and the potatoes are smaller than the chips they spawn? And because the taters are evenly placed, they look like a new design element which distracts the eye from the logo... they look like boobs on the bag or something? What were they thinking? This is a gorgeous treatment that is completely ruined by the photo elements being badly chosen and badly placed. Blergh. Such a missed opportunity.

   
• Property Brothers! BWAH HA HA HAAAAA. Things like this are when Saturday Night Live shines...

Biting satire that's funny because it's true. This is our reality.

   
• Precious Development?!? Parents are free to make decisions about their kid all they want. I mean, I draw the line when they are endangering the child but, for the most part, you do you when it comes to decisions about your own child. But this is abhorrent...

Fuck you and your Rainbow Bright face glitter shit. If you don't provide the teacher with alternative treats, what is the teacher supposed to do? Give everybody a treat EXCEPT your kid? How pissed off would you be then? It's entirely different if a kid has a peanut allergy and he was given peanuts. But a ring pop? To which she supplied no alternative? Like the teacher is supposed to go out and buy every alternative her class might require ON TOP OF the ring pops she already spent HER OWN MONEY on?!? Get fucked.

   
• Dear Deere! Another must watch video. "Why can't people repair the things they buy?" Because companies love money. iPhone broken? It can't be repaired by anybody but Apple or it gets bricked. McDonald's ice cream machine broken? Can't be repaired by anybody but the manufacturer or else you get sued (which is why they're always broken). Tractor broken? Can't get it repaired by anybody but John Deere because it's locked behind the software paywall. Spend a half-million dollars on a piece of John Deere equipment? You don't own it. They do. You're just paying for the right to license it. This is all kinds of fucked up, but corporations own the government, so they can do whatever the fuck they want to...

You don't own shit even if you pay for it. And lobbyists will keep spending billions to own politicians to keep it that way. God Bless 'Murica. But there is hope. "Right to Repair" laws are becoming a reality because politicians are being called out for their bullshit. More and more people need to speak out against this crap so that politicians will have no choice but to listen.

   
• Pepita Perfect! Last night I made one of my most favorite dishes: butternut squash ravioli in browned Kerrygold butter, crispy fried sage, toasted pepitas, and black peppercorns (which have been ground with a dash of nutmeg)...

I really need to buy a pasta roller so I can make my own though. Rana makes some good stuff, but I would prefer it without the orange color, as God intended, so it looks more appetizing instead of an orange blob. But anyway… a simple dish that’s also a bit complex in flavor.

   
• I HAVE TURBO PENIS! Yes, it happened to me! Lord how I love these debunk videos. Nobody does a takedown like Professor Dave. This should be mandatory viewing so that people understand how fucking stupid anti-vaxer "leaders" are...

The VAERS examination had me howling. How do people get duped by these idiots? It makes me crazy. We are losing herd immunity because people actually listen to these moronic douches.

   
• Men HATE This! GAG!!! I'm of the opinion that people should feel free to wear whatever the hell they want to wear. If you like it and it's comfortable and you can afford it... go for it. Nobody else has to approve. Nobody else's opinion matters. They aren't wearing it... you are. Which is why when I ran across this condescending gatekeeping asshole's YouTube channel, I couldn't roll my eyes hard enough. It's one thing to offer suggestions as to what people should consider wearing... it's quite another to pass judgement in the most immature and idiotic way possible. I mean, just look at these thumbnails...

She has very serious opinions as to what you're allowed to wear when you're over thirty. I'd argue that some could say that a woman over 35 shouldn't be wearing belly shirts as she's often seen doing... but I'm not a sanctimonious douche who spends my time gatekeeping clothing for views. Especially when you're acting like a fucking ten-year-old. An adult would realize that some people have to wear whatever they can afford... or whatever they're handed. So making fun of them or condemning them is a dick move. As it is when you make fun of people for wearing what they like.

   
• NEWSFLASH: RFK Jr. concedes administration lacks scientific evidence on Tylenol claims. OF COURSE THERE ISN'T ANY EVIDENCE, YOU STUPID FUCK! And yet you had the president announce to the world that Tylenol "causes autism." What kind of idiotic shit is running through your worm-riddled brain that you are so confident in spreading this crap misinformation? What kind of idiotic shit is running through President Trump's dementia-riddled brain that he believes your nonsense instead of ACTUAL FUCKING SCIENTIFIC RESEARCH?!? Christ, I hate living in the stupidest fucking timeline.

   
And now back to spending an extra hour of my Daylight Saving day.

It's gotten to the point where I seriously wonder if modern science deniers think that things like satellite television and mobile phones are powered by magic. At the rate they want to completely dismiss all scientific evidence when it comes to keeping humanity in good health, why wouldn't they think that Jesus allows them to make calls and access the internet from the smart phone in their pocket?

Thankfully, there's still pro-science advocates out there doing The Lord's work...

This is what we need more of. Though the odds of it getting through to people who have been brainwashed seems unlikely. But if the bullshit is not confronted early and often, it just makes it spread even further.

Like trying to use Ivermectin to cure COVID.

I am at such a loss as to understand how our toxic society became "anti-science" that I feel like I must be insane.

But then I saw something which put it in clear perspective for me...

And there it is.

Science has been such a huge fucking miracle in our lives that we can't conceive of what life was like before the discoveries we've been blessed with. And so kids are dying from preventable diseases and laws are in process to deny people from even having the option to get vaccinated.

Welcome to the death cult mentality which is fucking up the entire world.

Still recovering from a trip to the coast and back yesterday, but that's no excuse... because an all new Bullet Sunday starts... now...

   
• Super, Man! I loved pretty much every frame of Superman. Thank you, James Gunn for giving us a fantastic spectacle of a comic book movie that has me excited for new DC films. The one thing I don't get is how he could get everything so right with all the characters and the story... but saddle us with one of the most insanely weird takes on Jimmy Olson I've ever seen. I guess no movie is perfect... but damn. So close. And is it wrong that the reason I'm most looking forward to the Supergirl film is to see more Krypto?

And, oh yeah, I will be *very* upset if we don't get a Mr. Terrific series on HBO or HBO Max or whatever. NOT "The Terrifics"... I'm so done with "Team Arrow" and "Team Flash" and "Team Supergirl" and "Team Whatever" series... just Mr. Terrific. Maybe with an occasional guest star. But anyway... I'll put up a post with my full comments when I've had a chance to watch it again.

   
• Have it Our Way! Remember when Burger King actually let you "have it your way" instead of just saying you can "have it your way" but not really? BECAUSE MY WAY IS WITH EXTRA MAYO... AND YOUR NEW APP DOESN'T ALLOW THAT. You either get "regular" or nothing...

And notice how you can't see the ingredient you're altering. I can only guess that some bean-counting dumbass at corporate thinks that not allowing somebody to put an extra 2¢ worth of mayo on their fucking $8.19 Impossible Whopper is a good financial move. Well, it's making me not want to eat at your restaurant any more, so congratulations. I wonder if this dipshit is the same one in charge at Chipotle who thought raising prices and lowering portions at the same time would make their customers happy? What's so fucking stupid here is that I just asked for two packets of free mayo so I could add it to my burger myself, which most certainly costs more than just adding it from the giant mayo bucket. And speaking of this new app... did anybody at BK beta test it? I am assuming this third option is Coke Zero because the one before it is Diet Coke and there's 0 calories in it... but who the fuck knows?

There's absolutely no way to confirm it. And so I had to order for pick-up instead of drive-thru because I knew they'd hand me a cup and I could fill it with the correct Coke myself. Good Lord. Pathetic. This is the whole Sonos app disaster all over. Do these fucking companies ever learn?

   
• Via Variety: PETA Urges Nintendo to Remove ‘Mario Kart World’ Cow’s Nose Ring: ‘It’s-a Mean!’ To think there was a time I actually supported the dumbasses at PETA. What a fucking joke.With each new idiotic act, they make me want to go out and buy a steak...

And since I'm a vegetarian, that tells you about all you need to know.

   
• Pop Quiz, Hotshot! Take a guess...

And now I want Taco Bell. Which is about the only fast food restaurant left to me after this stupid Burger King fiasco.

   
• Via People: Plus Size Park Hoppers' Say Brutal Backlash Over Their Experiences at Disney Theme Parks Won't Stop Them. What is it with people? Just leave them alone. One of the more difficult things I witnessed at a Disney Parks was a couple who stood in line for over an hour to ride the Seven Dwarves Mine Car Ride. But when they got to the front of the line, the woman couldn't fit in the car. She asked if they could ride-swap so she could ride in a row by herself then her boyfriend could ride the next time, but they wouldn't let her because of the way the seats are built. — First of all, you'd think that Disney would have one row in just one car that is built for a larger person. And second of all, if the woman could have only visited a website which would have told her if she could fit, then she wouldn't have wasted an hour of her life for nothing and have to leave embarrassed and upset. — You'd think that assholes who make fun of these ladies or insult them would instead support them sharing this information, because you just know that they're in line complaining because they have to wait for larger people who are trying to see if they fit into the ride car.

   
• More Lies! As if we needed yet another video to point out how full of crap Ben Shapiro is. But here you go...

What a lying little shit stain. I have to wonder if he has ever been anything except disingenuous with his audience. This take-down is beautifully done. Elegantly pointing out that all Shapiro does... all he ever does... is lie.

   
• Via PBS: South Carolina lawmaker in jail on child sex abuse material charges resigns from office. Damn. These drag quee— WHAT? Yet ANOTHER anti-LGBTQ Republican asshole caught assaulting children? You know what... I'm beginning to think that drag queens aren't quite the threat that anti-LGBTQ Republicans say they are! They're just a convenient scapegoat!

   
And there you have it. I'm all out of bullets this fine Sunday.

HBO... also known as "Home Box Office" to people like me who grew up with it... started as a premium channel that you could add to your cable subscription package for an additional fee. It offered movies, specials, and other stuff at a time before VHS video tapes existed. The concept was hugely successful, and so other premium channels followed... Showtime... Cinemax... The Movie Channel... and more.

Over the years HBO has kept up with the times by having a streaming on-demand channel, which was originally called "HBO Now." They also had a version of this for their cable subscribers called "HBO Go." But, in the end, no matter where you went to consume their content, it was still HBO.

But then everything got rolled together and became "HBO Max."

And then something remarkable happened.

HBO, one of the most recognized brands in existence, decided to call themselves "Max."

I have no idea what dumbfuck came up with the idea to bury such a well-known brand by dropping the actual branding from the brand... but it was one of the stupidest advertising decisions I've ever seen. Companies would kill for the brand recognition that HBO had developed over the past 50+ years. They'd kill for it.

And HBO just threw it away.

When I got back from vacation on Saturday I saw a news story which said that "Max" was going to rebrand as "HBO Max" again, because people didn't seem to know what the fuck "Max" was. Which is why I never referred to it as "Max" ever. I always called it "HBO Max" because that way people actually know what the fuck I'm talking about.

I understand better than most that sometimes difficult decisions have to be made and the people in charge have to bite the bullet and make it for better or worse. But you'd think... you'd really think... that they would at least try to educate themselves about the decisions they make to keep from having a painfully obvious fuck-up. Especially when millions of dollars are at stake. "Brand recognition" is not some abstract concept. And anybody who's in charge of making decisions for a company at such a high level as HBO branding should fucking understand that concept.

But they didn't, and HBO paid the price.

Now they're trying to roll back this laughably catastrophic decision in an attempt to salvage the brand that they tossed in the trash.

Well, good luck with that.

Fortunately for them there were people like me who were ignoring their whole "Max" fiasco and keep the brand alive on their behalf (and I'm not alone... a lot of people and media outlets continued to call it "HBO" long after it had been rebranded). The problem for HBO (or, more accurately, their owner, Warner Bros. Discovery) are people during the past two years who don't know what the fuck "HBO" is because they've ever known the service as "Max."

And don't even get me started on the fifty buckets of stupid that is the name "Warner Bros. Discovery." Jesus. Who the fuck gives a shit about Discovery? Why rename your entire company to add something that has ridiculously poor brand recognition? The channel is still "Discovery" so what the fuck does that have to do with Warner Bros.?!? God... I just... HEY, DUMBASSES, I CAN CONSULT WITH YOUR BRANDING FOR FAR LESS MONEY THAT YOU'RE LOSING WITH ALL THESE SHITTY DECISIONS! CALL ME!

The TikTok hearing is about as fucking embarrassing as this country gets.

A bunch of bought-and-paid-for ignorant idiots who have zero concept of how technology works have jumped on the bi-partisan bandwagon to distract everybody from the fact that they're a bunch of useless pieces of shit, and American citizens are supposed to be cheering them on?

Christ.

And so TikTok will likely be banned, thanks to Facebook paying off politicians to be all angry about it and get rid of their business rival over shit that Facebook does ALL THE TIME!

What's amazing is how these fucking lobbiest taint-lickers ask questions of TikTok CEO Shou Zi Chew, then don't allow him to answer and refuse to listen to anything he has to say. This is what counts as discourse in government?

We have fascists at the wheel deciding what we get to read by burning books. What we get to watch for entertainment by banning drag shows. How we identify by banning trans persons. Whom we get to love by banning same-sex marriage. And what websites and apps we get to use by banning fucking TikTok.

Didn't we fight wars against exactly this kind of bullshit?

And the fact that this is starting to become bi-partisan behavior is not lost on me. It just proves what I've been saying all along... politicians will do and say whatever they fucking have to in order to stay in power... even if it means selling out the country to do it... and it doesn't matter one fucking lick what team they play for.

All while telling us that they're doing it "for our protection."

What we actually need protection from is the fucking government.

Facebook can sell our private data to Chinese companies and Congress doesn't bat an eye. Because they're paid not to. But a Chinese company collects our data and suddenly Congress is outraged. Because they're paid to.

Until money gets pulled out of the equation, this is exactly the kind of stupid shit we vote for.

At this rate, it's only a matter of time before Blogography gets banned to "protect us" from my being critical of the government.

Our fascist distopian future is now.

Today I fell down an anti-vax, anti-science, flat-earth, we-never-landed-on-the-moon rabbit hole of stupid that still has me shaking my head. It's like... the "expert" that gets cited is always just some guy. Or some disgraced doctor. Or some "trust-me-bro" media personality. And the "data" is usually opinion masquerading as facts. Or good data interpreted badly. Sometimes people don't bother reading past a headline to form a complete opinion... even if the headline has absolutely nothing to do with what's actually happening.

But the big mystery for me is how the world's ENTIRE SCIENTIFIC COMMUNITY and THE VAST, VAST MAJORITY OF DOCTORS AND SPECIALISTS are all on the payroll of NASA or Big Pharma or whom-the-fuck-ever. Do you know how many doctors there are worldwide? How many scientists? The money needed to pay off every last one of them would exceed all profits of all these entities that are supposedly paying them to keep quiet about the "truth."

Am I saying straight-up that vaccines are 100% harmless and NASA isn't hiding shit? Oh hell no. Anybody that certain is selling you something (probably "nutritional supplements" guaranteed to cure COVID!). And I am always open to the possibility that new facts and new data may come to light which can refute any science or data currently in evidence.

But this whole "My wife's cousin's best friend's co-worker's neighbor's electrician's dog groomer's pediatrist's mortician says that vaccines cause massive blood clots in every vaccinated corpse they examine!" is about the most sublimely idiotic excuse for "research" imaginable.

But, to an increasing number of people on this planet, that's the "reasearch" that matters, so good luck to us not going extinct or whatever.

Christ.

There's nothing that indicates just how fucking beyond stupid Apple has gotten than this bit of drama I experienced tonight. The AppleTV remote in my bedroom has never worked. The trackpad on the top doesn't move reliably. So I threw it in a box in the garage and just use my iPhone.

At least I did until tonight.

I went to turn on my TV/AppleTV and got this nonsense...

Which is essentially saying that you need a remote to use your iPhone as a remote.

Seriously. How do they come up with this shit?

Is ANYBODY at Apple actually using their products or beta testing shit any more?

Number 6,438 in my list of SHIT APPLE DOES THAT NOBODY FUCKING ASKED FOR: Apple Mail Inline Link Preview.

Who the fuck thought that this useless fucking PREVIEW OF NOTHING is needed, desired, or in any way helpful? It's like... here's a link to a Facebook page, and Apple removes the link to put a HIDEOUS BIG-ASS LINK LOGO IN THE MIDDLE OF YOUR EMAIL...

And, of course, because this is fucking Apple, there' no way to turn this shit off by default.

Oh no. You have to right click and tell it to go back to a sane "plain link."

God I am so sick and fucking tired of this kind of crap. It's only slightly less annoying that Adobe changing the way shit has worked FOR DECADES with no way to go back to the original behavior. Or the way that they randomly switch between origin-zoom and scrubby-zoom in Illustrator with no way to force a default. Typical. It's like... PICK ONE. I don't give a shit which way you go... JUST FUCKING PICK ONE!

My heat is still on, so things are toasty here at Blogography... because an all new Bullet Sunday starts... now...

   
• AWWWWW! You guys... YOU GUYS...

Derpy puppies are the best puppies.

   
• Darwinism! Fuck your 12 years of med school... Dr. Google is my god now!

I just feel bad that the kids are at the mercy of this stupid shit. But... I suppose if they are just going to continue propagating it to newer generations, it might be for the best? It sickens me that anti-science has become so prevalent and dangerous that these kind of thoughts go through my head, but here we are. What the fuck has become of us?

   
• Fury! I didn't just dislike the Shazam! movie... I loathed the fucking thing. It was categorically awful from start to finish. Now, thanks to DC Comics' "FanDome" event there was a look at the sequel...

Honestly? I had zero intent on watching the thing... even when it came out on video. But then they cast Helen Mirren and Lucy Liu as the villains? NOW I AM FORCED TO WATCH, DANGIT! Hopefully i doesn't suck as hard as the first one.

   
• Cuntry! Not only do I know all of these countries, I’ve been to all of them except Chile. But I did get close when I visited Argentina on the way to Antarctica, you condescending fuck...

The entire channel is filled with "If you don't get these, you're American" TikToks... and it's like... look... I get it. Americans are largely ignorant of the world outside our borders. But constantly harping on this ceases to make it funny... it just makes you a fucking dick.

   
• The BATman! BWAH HA HA HAAAAA!! ZOMFG! They went over the top… and not in a good way. Maybe it’s the way the trailer is cut together, but this looks fucking embarrassing...

Apparently the Nolan Dark Night Trilogy is still safe as the defining cinematic Batman. Oh well. I guess I’ll know for sure once I’ve seen it.

   
• DOG SENSE! Jesus. It’s just... why. If you disagree with policy, DON’T FLY. It’s not fucking rocket science. Though apparently it is for assholes like this...

Please just get the COVID you’re dying to get, then pick up your Darwin Award already. I’m so sick of this shit.

   
• Ending on a Happy Note! Boy... Yes Theory is back and I somehow missed it! This is pretty great...

=sigh= I miss travel. The world is full of such wonders.

   
And now I'm off again...