I'm way too tired to think about blogging, but it cannot be helped... because an all new Bullet Sunday starts...now...
• Solo Funtime Gaming! If you've taken a look at my game collection at Board Game Geek, you'll have seen that there's only one game which gets a perfect 10 ("Outstanding. Always want to play and expect this will never change")... and it's called Puzzle Dungeon. It's essentially a more fun version of Solitaire. I originally had it as a "print-and-play" game, where you pay for a file that you can print out and play with. I fell in love with it immediately. Until my cards were lost and I couldn't find the file to reprint them. I tried to buy a printed set but, wisely, there were none available on eBay because people don't want to part with them. Except I recently found out that the designer, Brian Garber, has reprinted the game and is selling it on his Etsy shop...
And, let me tell you, I snapped up the Deluxe Box, the Expansion Set, and the Play Mat SO fast. I haven't played in years, and October 19th (the ship date) can't come soon enough. I really hope that his Puzzle Dungeon: Pets expansion gets printed one day. And that his other game, To The Death eventually gets reprinted, because I'd love to play that.
• Not Helping! One of the most classic of the classic BritComs is That Mitchell and Webb Look. There's been a hit of controversy over this 20-year-old show lately because the BBC cut out some sketches which were deemed "insensitive to modern audiences" or something like that. But the situation is a bit more complicated than that. One of the sketches was cut because Mitchell and Webb were in blackface. But the sketch was pointing out that the white people were able to overlook that the blackface was racist until the situation escalated, and it was the escalation which convinced them to stop and not the actual blackface. The ignorance is the entire point of the sketch. So maybe it's not that modern audiences are "sensitive" to it... it's more likely that modern audiences wouldn't understand it. I don't know. Since I'm white, it's really not my place to say whether it's racist, so I trust that the BBC looked into it by consulting those who can make that call. But in any event, Mitchell and Webb have been back for a few months with a new YouTube series called Mitchell and Webb Are Not Helping. I've been enjoying it...
I hope they keep going with the series, because their humor has had more than a few bits that were highly insightful and relevant even today, with this being their most famous...
Though there's talk that the BBC wanted to cut that sketch as well, so maybe I'm completely out of the loop? I wonder if this one was considered...
AND THEN... the state of inoffensive comedy gets a comment...
A new classic.
• Perfect! Verbi can be brutal. But always hilarious...
I've used Verbi to try and expand my vocabulary, and the app is never completely happy with your performance.
• Cash! A dollar is a dollar...
LOL. As insane as it sounds, I'm sure there are plenty of people wearing a band shirt who can't name any of their songs.
• The Mighty Thor! For the longest time, I'd see a guy named "Thoren Bradley" pop up on my social media. His entire deal was grabbing an axe and splitting big chunks of wood. And a lot of women shared his posts, which is why he was everywhere. But I never thought to follow him until he started sharing his thoughts on anything and everything. And it turns out he's a very smart thinker who can enunciate his takes on things very well indeed. Which really seems to piss off the "alpha male" contingent...
@bradley.thor Replying to @jimmynorris1971 ♬ original sound - Thoren Bradley
Whatever his sexuality may be, he's never going to stop having female fans, that's for sure...
@bradley.thor ♬ original sound - Thoren Bradley
And about that...
• Feeeemales! It's fucking incredible that this country is content to treat half the population as nothing more than birthing machines, undeserving of proper care when something goes terribly wrong...
This country hates women. Hates them.
• SERIOUSLY HATES THEM! A 20-year-old Cornell student says she was pressured into snorting ketamine at the Chi Phi house in Ithaca on the night of October 19, 2024. At 1:42am, according to her lawsuit, a fraternity member posted two words in the frat’s Snapchat group chat, Chi Phi Actives: "Free pussy.” The complaint says Johnathan Newell sent it. More men came upstairs after that. She says the assault went on until about 5:45 in the morning. More than four hours. These seven men are named in the lawsuit:
• Matthew Ingalls
• Johnathan Newell
• Winston Lee
• Gillio Lopes
• Diego Sarabia
• Scott Norris
• Scott Kretzschmar
She reported it to campus police on November 8, 2024. The fraternity was suspended, and so were those seven men, temporarily. Then, according to the lawsuit, Cornell offered them a way to “mitigate” what they’d done. Write an essay... yes, an essay. Those named deny any wrongdoing. This information was taken from a Facebook post, but reported in The Cornell Daily Sun.
And, on that entirely depressing note, I'm off to prepare for the busy week ahead.
I'm in a bitchy mood and probably shouldn't be blogging, but it's all good... because an all new Bullet Sunday starts...now...
• noPhone! Well, shoot. Guess I'm saving my money and not buying a new iPhone 18 Pro Max after all. Turns out the only thing I give a crap about, the new variable aperture, is a non-starter because the photo sensor on the iPhone is so small that the aperture doesn't really have much of an effect when it comes to depth of field...
And so... maybe next year. Because right now the camera on the 18 Pro is not enough for me to switch just as the 17 Pro wasn't before it.
• Eyesight! On Friday I had to run to the Big City for work. While I was there, I dropped by Costco. Where I spent way too much money. I bought new silverware because my old stainless steel stuff (which I love) is starting to get messed up... I bought new reading glasses, because it's time I bumped up from -1.5 to -2.0, alas... and I also bought a 2-pound tub of Rojo's Street Corn Dip, which I will end up eating in less than a week...
Because it's just that insanely delicious.
• The Great Beyond! After Costco, I ran by Fred Meyer to pick up five packages of Beyond Stack Burgers. But before I picked up my online order, I went inside and picked up an additional five packages because they were on sale for a crazy good price. Thank heavens I bought that small freezer for my garage!
So now I have 80 burgers ready to go. Since I eat them morning, noon, and night, I figure they might last me until mid-November sometime. Hopefully they will go on sale by then, because they're way expensive when they're not on sale. Of course, I'd rather pay full price than have them discontinued by Fred Meyer, since they are the only store in the entire valley which has them.
• Reach for the Sky! The latest season of Reacher was incredible. I was very sad it was over and I'm having to wait months or years for new episodes. However... we did get a new series to help lessen the blow, a Neagley spin-off!
The show is amazing, as expected. And, talk about lessening the blow, Amazon Prime may have given us Neagley... but they canceled Ride or Die, which pisses me the fuck off. The show was highly regarded, highly rated, and had great promise for a second season. How the hell do they decide where to spend their money?
• Rarity! Now this is fucking cool as all getout...
Isn't stuff like this incredible? Doesn't it just blow your mind that a substance like this can exist?
• Interplanet Janet! Alrighty... we're going from cool shit dug out from the earth to cool shit we're doing in space! This is an incredible video. And the visualizations they're using are some of the best I've seen. Well worth your valuable time to watch...
We are capable of some truly great things as we reach for the stars. Sadly, we would apparently rather spend our time fighting in the dirt. What a waste.
• The Incredible Shrinking Food! Thanks to idiotic fucking tariffs plus out-of-control fuel costs thanks to an idiotic fucking war, the price of food is insanely expensive now. And once again food companies are trying to camouflage it with shrinkflation. My hummus was advertised as having a lower price... BUT THE CONTAINER WAS NOTICEABLE SMALLER...
And don't even ask me what the fuck this is. According to the company who makes these chips, this is a full bag. Seriously, I haven't touched a single chip yet!
It's all so fucking insane. We're paying record prices for "LOWER GROCERIES ON DAY ONE" yet getting fuck-all for it.
And now back to being even more bitchy than what I can blog about.
First Dolly, then Tim Curry? Truly we are living in a doomed timeline. Reality is collapsing around us.
Of course I was introduced to Mr. Curry in The Rocky Horror Picture Show. The movie was released in 1975, but I didn't see it until over a decade later in 1986 when it was already established as a cult classic. I did one of the famous midnight showings at the Neptune Theater in the U-District of Seattle. It was a fantastic experience, largely due to Tim's performance as the sweet transvestite from transexual Transylvania, Dr. Frank-N-Furter...
Then came Legend, destined to be yet another cult classic. He played Darkness, but I had no idea until years after I saw the movie in theater on VHS. He completely disappeared in the role, and to this day I have no idea how he was considered for it. Something I really do need to research one of these days...
The same year as Legend came Clue, giving Tim the ultimate cult classic trifecta...
After a strange detour in The Hunt for Red October Mr. Curry landed his most iconic role, the deadly clown Pennywise in It...
After loads of voice work, we were treated to his take on Long John Silver in Muppet Treasure Island, a role which proved, without a shadow of a doubt, that Tim Curry was a singular acting talent... because who else could hold their own against The Muppets?!?
The amount of voice work in his oeuvre is really impressive...
As always, the best person to discuss his career is Time Curry...
Rest in Peace, sir. Your work brought a lot of happiness to a lot of people.
I am mostly dead today. Sitting in my living room with air purifiers on full blast trying not to die from having been out in an Air Quality Index of 258.
In other news... the surprise fourth season of Ted Lasso has been airing. And it's got a real meta thing going on.
This series is about Ted coaching women's football. Which, as you can imagine, has many fans of the show outraged because it's a different take on Ted Lasso than the show they fell in love with. Which proves the entire point of the new season. And the show-runners drove that home by having a shareholder's meeting. After the Greyhounds were discussed (or rather, not discussed, thanks to Roy Kent being Roy Kent) and the conversation switched to the Lady Greyhounds, most of the room got up to leave.
But, hey, to me even the worst season of Ted Lasso is better than most of the other crap on television...
And now? I need to pack a suitcase...
I finally got around to watching Lanterns (HBO)... for the second time. Something I wanted to do ten seconds after the first time. The show is that good.
Despite the fact that it's got Kyle Chandler in it, I held my expectations in check. I pretty much had to, because it was made very clear that this was more of a slow-burn mystery series instead of an action-based show with super-hero battle after super-hero battle. All the previews show the characters mostly in plain clothes, not costumes...
From the above teaser, it looks like some cosmic action is forthcoming. I can't wait to see it.
As a serious insomniac for decades, I am not used to being so exhausted that I can't keep my eyes open. I'm pretty sure it's my brain trying to adapt to my vision catastrophe going on in my right eye. I'm constantly having floating black spots that my brain has to filter out as not being bugs or flies... and blurry spots in motion where my brain is having to fill in the blanks... and hazy spots on the edges my brain is trying to see through. Not ideal. But don't you worry about the bullets... because an all new Bullet Sunday starts...now...
• Licenses for Luddites! Just a reminder that the Washington State government is regressive as fuck when it comes to digital driver's licenses... but is very quick to tout us as a bastion of technology around election time. Patty Murray and Maria Cantwell blow through tax dollars like Kleenex for everything else... why not help us keep up with (checks notes) West Virginia and Arkansas on stuff like this. It's fucking embarrassing, and we're tired of having to carry a license around when our phones are already with us. We're nearly half-way through the states who have them. Will Washington get in before #25 hits? Let's take a look at where we're at, shall we?
Spoiler Alert: Not. Fucking. Likely. If they haven't pulled the trigger by now, they've likely got zero plans. They've got Big Pharma checks to cash, and that takes priority over everything.
• Politics in America! Tell me this isn't how politics work here...
You can't. Because this is exactly how politics work here. No bill is passed "clean" any more... there's always some horrific bullshit tacked onto it.
• Narrative! Nobody takes the minutes to verify crap like this before sharing it with the world, and nobody who follows them cares if it's true or not... they believe it because they want to believe it.
Yes. Mamdani went to the ruins of the church... AND DEMOLISHED IT WITH HIS OWN TWO HANDS!! That's how much he hates Christians! Jesus Christ. Do these assholes EVER research this bullshit they shovel? There are people who read this crap AND BELIEVE IT!! And they vote. But not in New York... a place THEY HAVE LIKELY NEVER EVEN BEEN.
• Cake! "No one’s gotten a cake for me before. I bought my own cake in the middle of the night and blew out my own candles alone." (Here's a link in case TikTok is being a dick)...
@copic_pereira Last year, I could only get Connor a cake but his reaction was priceless ❤️ We had just started sharing our lives here and we had planned a small party at our place for our close friends. During the party, we went Live on here, and you guys noticed that I had vanished for a good while. That’s when Connor found me in the bathroom in excruciating pain, trying to not ruin his party. Turns out I had gallstones, and I spent almost a week in the hospital. So, we never got to properly celebrate his birthday and we changed that this year. Thank you so much for all of you that follows us!!! It was only possible because of you ❤️❤️❤️ #fyp #birthday #mlm #marriedlife #couplegoals ♬ Married Life (From "Up") - Sergy el Som
It hurts my heart that there are people so cruel that they would want a fellow human be alone for the rest of their life because of who they love. This man found his person and his community. He's hurting nobody by existing. Let him pursue his happiness, celebrate his birthday with people who care about him, and live in peace. For God's sake... just be kind.
• "You didn't mention the donkey!" Given the abhorrent state of the world today, I often find myself scouring YouTube for something funny to distract me. And few things are as hilariously distracting as Would I Lie To You...
If you want more, there's a channel right here.
• Witchcraft! I love videos which explain science in a way you can understand it without having a science background. This one had me captivated from the start...
Wild stuff. And very cool.
Since it's been a full two hours since my last nap, I guess it's time.
Dang.
Sam Neil had a lot of great roles over his long career. I think the first time I saw him was as Borodin in The Hunt for Red October, where he had a small but significant role. A role which had the most memorable scene in the entire film for me. After that, he would pop up in oh so many films, his most notable likely being Jurassic Park.
He will very much be missed...
Photo by Ross Coffey via IMDB
I think the last thing I saw him in was Thor: Love and Thunder in a bit part. He was an actor playing an actor playing Odin, but he was immediately recognizable... and a real treat for fans of his work like I am.
Rest in Peace, sir.
I've been sick allll weekend. But don't worry about a thing... because an all new Bullet Sunday starts...now...
• Greed Hike! After record-breaking financial quarters worth billions upon billions of dollars in profit, Tim Cook announced that price hikes for Apple devices are "unavoidable," and they arrived this week. It's been noted that last year alone Apple raked in $112 billion and spent $310 billion on stock buybacks. Which is to say that Tim Cook is full of shit. His company has more money than some countries, and the idea that they can't absorb the RAM price increases THAT APPLE FUCKING CONTRIBUTED TO WITH THEIR AI BULLSHIT, well... forgive me for laughing. And for hanging on to my existing Apple products for a good, long, while.
• Don't Get Grifted! The insanity just keeps piling up...
People are entirely too easy to manipulate when it comes to their health. And I have no idea how we got here.
• Feral Hogs! This may seem funny... but my friend Doug and I were chased by feral hogs in Kauai, and it was terrifying. They are horrific. Which, if you've seen the movie Hannibal, you already know...
You would not want to meet a feral hog in a dark alley. Or anywhere else, I'm guessing.
• She's Super! The hate being lobbed at Milly Alcock because she dared to accept an acting job as Supergirl in a movie is repugnant. Snyder fan-bros aren't just content to say "I am not going to watch the movie because I don't like the direction of the James Gunn universe"... oh no. They have to attack Milly's looks and anything else they can think of to make it personal, despite the fact that she's getting rave reviews by people who don't care for the movie that much...
On every post where Supergirl is even mentioned, Snyder-bros are unloading with hate and adding things like "FLOP!" and "Sasha Calle is the ONLY Supergirl!" and whatever. And here's the thing. These same people didn't even turn out for Saha Calle's only appearance as Supergirl in The Flash, which is widely regarded as one of the biggest box office flops of all time. The projection here is insane.
• Cut-Proof? It's genuinely jaw dropping how the fact that an abundance of evidence exists to disprove the non-stop lies, but people are still choosing to believe them all...
Counting to 45,000 isn't difficult at all when you don't fucking count in the first place.
• Receipts! Megyn Kelly unleashed a disgusting viral video against Haitians who arrived here with a temporary protection status. It was horrific enough that people are coming forward with viral comments of their own to hit back. And, if they are even half-true, they're damning enough that they should ruin her. But we all know how that works. People like this get a pass for some reason. I can't fathom how Amy Coney Barrett will explain voting to strip TPS protections from endangered Haitians when two of her adopted children are from Haiti and this will likely result in some... or many... of them losing their life.
• Watson is on the Case! There's a practice at Apple whereas some company comes out with a very good app for their various devices which has killer features... at which point Apple will put those same features into their own apps or operating systems, essentially destroying the app which had the idea first. Way back in 2001 an app named Watson was released by a small developer which added a lot of useful tools to Apple's Sherlock search utility. Soon after, Apple released an updated Sherlock which could do all the things Watson could do... and it was game over. After this kept happening, the term "Sherlocking" was popularized to describe the process. Fast forward to now and Apple's new Siri-enabled Calendar app allows you to add appointments and such just by talking or typing to it with natural language commands. This was the hallmark feature of a competing calendar app called Fantastical, which I purchased back in the day. And I still use it, even though the developer switched to the dreaded "subscription model" which I do not pay for because my old license allows the basic functions to still be used. So now the question becomes... will I ditch Fantastical in favor of Calendar? And the answer is yes, probably. I'd rather not have additional apps installed to worry about, and odds are Apple's built-in app will work fine for me. Not that Fantastical's developer will care, because they're not getting any money off of me anyway. On one hand I'm sad that another developer has been Sherlocked. It's bad for the platform. But, on the other hand, I hate subscription models so much that I won't be losing any sleep over it either.
And now back to my recovery.
So there I was doom-scrolling through Disney+ to find some background noise while I worked. And there it was... Naked and Afraid.
I've heard of the show, of course. But I've never seen it and it's never popped up on YouTube (which is what I'm watching 90% of the time).
Now, I have nothing against survival adventure shows. I've watched Running Wild (the Bear Grylls show) and Survivorman, and they're fine. Likely staged to a certain extent, but fine.
And then there's Naked and Afraid. No idea why they're naked. I guess butt-cheeks and blurred naughty bits draw viewers...
The show is fine. Weird but fine.
But I'd rather watch Survivor.
Day three of watergeddon is at hand.
I'm back down to no water at all, which means another day of feeling grimy. AND ANOTHER DAY OF NOT BEING ABLE TO COOK MY BELOVED BUTTERNUT SQUASH IN BROWN BUTTER WITH CRISPY-FRIED SAGE! The next time I get even a trickle of water, I'm filling up every container in the house.
Which is what I should have been doing all along.
The good news is that I finally got to see the Spider-Noir series on Amazon Prime. I knew I'd love it because I'm such a huge Nicholas Cage fan, but it's so much more than him... it's a really good story that looks amazing (especially in Black & White, which is how I decided to watch it)...
Finally... finally... Sony used their Spidey franchise license responsibly again. Which leads me to wonder if they'll get all stupid again and give us another Morbius or Madame Web or Kraven. Lord I hope not. Better they just sell the film rights back to Marvel than create another horrible mess out of things.
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