I couldn't be a bigger fan of Honorary Doctor of Science, Dame Jane Goodall.

I learned about her as a kid. I think it might have been with a Schoolastic book or something. After that, I heard about her off and on for many, many years. Mostly in talk show appearances, which she continued to appear in until quite recently...

Wonderful.

It's remarkable to think about how she started her career over 60 years ago when she was 26 years old...

And never stopped. Becoming a legend in the conservation of chimpanzees and their habitats...

But what made me really fall in love with Jane was after Gary Larson made a cartoon around her in The Far Side...

Somebody from her institute lost their shit and fired off a scathing letter, incensed that Larson would dare to call Jane Goodall a "tramp." Which, of course, is not at all what's happening. But, well, you know... some people are easily set off.

But not Jane Goodall, who said that she found the cartoon funny. She said that it was her favorite rendition of her in pop culture. Which is probably why she wrote an introduction to one of Larson's The Far Side Gallery books.

And why Gary Larson visited Goodall's lab in Tanzania.

And why Gary Larson let Jane put the cartoon on a shirt and let her keep all profits for her institute...

It's difficult not to be saddened by her passing, but more difficult to not feel amazed by what she did with her 91 years on earth...

Rest in Peace.

Your humanity towards wildlife made you more human than most.

   
Why do I watch the news? It just keeps getting worse and worse.

The wildfire smoke has been so bad that I ended up taking the weekend off. From everything. Including blogging.

Despite the fact that I cowered in my home with air purifiers on full power... Saturday was residual misery from going to work in heavy smoke on Friday, and Sunday I made the mistake of taking out the garbage without a mask. In a city which I would later learn had the worst air quality in the entire country.

Fires to t he North. Fires to the South. And I read that some people are starting to wonder if the fires might merge. At which point I will be evacuating along with the rest of the city.

Personally, I think it's unlikely. As the weather cools and rain is forecast, fire containment by our firefighters seems the safer bet. Fortunately, it's not July right now, or I'd be pretty worried.

Well, more worried than usual.

My view on the way home yesterday felt like the End of Days.

A canyon outside of town is under immediate evacuation. Air tanker planes are flying overhead, shaking the house and freaking out the cats. The fire began 24 days ago. Now 31,000 acres are in flames. Winds are making containment difficult. We could really use rain... but I worry that it could come with lightning and start more fires...

I honestly thought we'd escape a major fire this season. Guess not.

Picture it...

You just spent $3,500 on a new smart refrigerator. It has a 32-inch touchscreen on it where you can see your calendar, display messages to your family, show your security camera feeds... even display photos and reminders! Not only that, but there's cameras inside so you can see inside your fridge while at the store... and AI watches what you put in and take out so it can remind you when you're running low on something. As if that wasn't enough, the doors open by touch sensor, so there's no having to grab for a handle when you've got your hands full. Smart drawers can be adjusted for different tasks... from keeping frozen foods frozen to keeping vegetables fresh!

Sure it cost you $3,500, but just look at all the features you get! It's everything you never knew you needed in life!

And then...

Samsung decides that they're going to display ads on your refrigerator's screen.

$3,500 for a refrigerator that turns into a billboard.

And this is everything that's wrong with modern companies. They cannot fucking stop selling you shit. They want those sweet ad dollars, and don't care how much you fucking hate them for it. Because money...

It's like Netflix all over again. The entire appeal of Netflix was the fact that you didn't have to sit through ads. But now you have to pay a shit-ton of money to get an ad-free experience. All the other streaming channels are the same. With the exception of AppleTV+, I think, but surely it's just a matter of time?

I find stuff like this Samsung bullshit to be outrageous. If I owned one of these refrigerators and was told that now I'm going to be sold ads ON SOMETHING I FULLY PAID FOR, I would sue. Sue like the wind.

Then I would use all the money I won to go ad-free on my new refrigerator.

The wildfire smoke was back with a vengeance this morning, which made for a miserable day. I masked up in a futile attempt to not end up with itchy lungs, which is the worst, but to no avail. I had to drive into the Big City after lunch and ended up pulling over on the way back to puke my guts out into my car's garbage bag. Doesn't get more fun than that.

After stopping by home to brush my teeth, I went back to work and felt like dying for two hours. Then I drove home and have felt like dying for four more hours.

The good news is that the Air Quality Index dropped from a hazardous 294 to a slightly less hazardous 257.

The bad news is that it will probably still be smokey enough to make me sick tomorrow.

Also the bad news... more misinformation bullshit has been unleashed upon an unsuspecting world... vaccines AND Tylenol causes autism now?!? God. I suppose not even the fact that the World Health Organization has declared there's no evidence of any of this will make no difference. Just throw it on the ever-growing pile of idiocy that's going to fuck over humanity. I mean, if people believe the earth is flat, they'll believe anything.

Meanwhile, I'm off to bed way too early in the hopes that I can somehow fall asleep so my lungs can clear out and not feel fuzzy and itchy any more. Where's my Tylenol PM?

I somehow forgot the reason why I didn't pre-order Fantastic Four: First Steps. Namely, they're charging $30 for it.

So when I got home and saw an ad that it was released, I actually got excited for a second. Then I saw $30 and was puzzled all over again. I will happily pay $20 for a movie I am dying to see. Might pay $25, if it's something special (like this one). But thirty fucking dollars?!?? No thanks. To rent the thing is $25, but I refuse to pay that much money for something I can't watch again whenever I want...

What's really weird is that Marvel is pricing the film like it was some box office smash that people can't wait to see (or see again). Sure it made a half-billion dollars... but it can't touch the nearly three billion that Avengers: Endgame hauled in. Seriously... thirty dollars?!??

I'm honestly trying to think if there's any movie I would pay that amount for. And I honestly don't think there is.

Oh well. I'm sure it will be on sale fairly soon.

Today's internet rabbit hole brought to you by... THE END OF DAYS!

It's supposed to happen, yet again, sometime tonight or tomorrow, assumably depending on which time zone you're in. This latest date for the Rapture is courtesy of a South African pastor who said that Jesus Christ told him directly when it was happening back in June.

And despite the fact that these things never come true, people are totally believing the guy.

I've watched a lot of their TikToks. All of the video creators claiming to be devout Christians.

Which I highly doubt, because if they had read their Bible they would have seen Matthew 24:36, which addresses the time for End of Days thusly...

"But about that day or hour no one knows, not even the angels in heaven, nor the Son, but only the Father."

Which is to say that the odds of God telling some pastor somewhere when the Rapture is coming before Jesus even knows he's coming back is laughably crazy.

Let's continue with Matthew 24:37-39, shall we?

"As it was in the days of Noah, so it will be at the coming of the Son of Man. For in the days before the flood, people were eating and drinking, marrying and giving in marriage, up to the day Noah entered the ark; and they knew nothing about what would happen until the flood came and took them all away. That is how it will be at the coming of the Son of Man.

How the fuck is that in ANY way unclear? God is not dropping by with a warning about the return of Jesus. To anybody. According to the Bible, you'll be out living your life and... BLAM! Heeeeeeeere's Jesus!

But anyway...

If you never hear from me again, it's because I've been Raptured and am chillin' in heaven at the Supper of the Lamb with JC.

I'm sure I'll be forgiven for not believing yet another random person claiming to have been told when the world was ending.

It's a cold, dreary, and wet day, so I'm guessing Fall must be here, but I won't be wasting time mourning the end of Summer... because an all new ALL FOOD & EATING Bullet Sunday starts... now...

   
• Food Talk! I fell down another rabbit hole on the internet... this time with a podcast called Lunchbox Envy. The episodes are like potato chips in that you can't watch just one. There's also a clips channel with short videos that have interesting food facts...

Food is always interesting because it reflects the culture and environment of the people eating it. But there's something to be said about discussing interesting things about the food you eatmin your own culture.

   
• Plum Sweet! I could watch bats eating all day long...

Bats are adorable in all the right ways. But bats eating is next level.

   
• Taters! I've had all these dishes because I love potatoes so much, and have tried well over 100 recipes for them...

I'm a little sad that the Japanese croquet included meat, because when I was traveling to Japan, the way they make them without meat is amazing because of how they're seasoned. The most interesting option here is the Turkish baked potato, which I had without the hot dog. It seems a weird combination of toppings, but it really works... and I need to make one soon, because I haven't had it in at least a decade. And I can make it with a veggie dog!

   
• We'll Be Having Eggs! Chef José Andrés broke the internet when he unveiled his secret for an amazing omelette in less than a minute (on Rogan, of all places). It's just and egg with mayonnaise mixed in. I had one this morning and can verify that it is indeed very delicious and very easy to make...

I have been buying microwaveable frozen omelettes because I don't eat a lot of eggs any more, and don't want them expiring. I am very curious to know if the José Andrés omelettes can be frozen and still taste good, because that would be a lot cheaper.

   
• Sliced! Slicing bread is not an overwhelming task. You pull out a serrated knife and you start sawing it. But when you make a lot of bread, a tool like this looks pretty fantastic, just because it looks like it makes perfectly even slices...

But the problem with stuff like this? You then have to clean it. Which doesn't look fun at all.

   
• Food Map! D gets me Southern Italy, India, China, Australia, New Zealand, Israel, a good chunk of Greece, Japan, Indonesia, Cambodia, Laos, Turkey, a nice chunk of the Middle East, the Philippines, and more? Sign me up...

I would badly miss Mexican and African cuisine... and I'd be missing most of the European dishes I wouldn't get... but, yeah, D... second choice G. They have the best variety of what I most love to eat.

   
• UtiliBread! I have a sourdough starter that I use for absolutely everything bread-related. From loaves to pizza crust to hamburger buns... it's good for anything I could want. Then I found this interesting no-knead dough that I very much want to try sometime...

Because you can never have too much bread!

   
• Umami Whammy! It's bizarre to me how MSG is in so many foods, yet people treat it like some kind of toxic chemical or something (seriously, look at the ingredients on a bag of Nacho Cheese Doritos and get back to me). The misinformation campaign started as a way of discrediting foreign foods (MSG is a staple of Asian cooking), and became urban legend so people think it causes headaches or whatever. And yet most people are eating it without knowing and don't seem to complain? Well, I love the stuff. It only takes a small amount, and I put it in many foods that I make (it makes potato salad and vegetarian meat-substitutes sing). This guy does a test which compares common foods with and without MSG, and it's a pretty great video which mirrors my experience...

So... if you want to add some mouthwatering appeal to your cooking and ignore the misinformation that plagues it, try just a small amount of MSG and find out if it makes a difference to you.

   
• Cost of Living? Can anybody tell me to get those cheaper groceries that were promised on "Day One?" Because I just paid an astronomical sum for a very small amount of groceries. The only thing that seems to be down in price are eggs (which makes sense because the chicken population is being restored after so many were killed because of the Avian flu). Alas, I don't eat many eggs... so that means I'm paying more for everything I'm buying. Price indexes say we're paying 29% more than 2020, but that actually seems an understatement, because the size of products is decreasing as prices are increasing. And the prices are only going to get worse... likely far worse... because tariffs, deportations of agriculture workers, and climate change are driving up prices with no end in sight. Just like economists said would happen before the election. I don't understand how somebody who prioritizes personal gain and funneling money to his wealthy corporate donors while knowing nothing about how tariffs work was ever going to be a solution to high prices. The guy bankrupted a casino... A CASINO! And where is all that tariff money going? Tax breaks for billionaires, I'm guessing.

   
I should probably go out and start pulling all my dying plants for compost, but it's not at all pleasant outside so I guess I'm holding off on that. Instead I think I'll cook something because I'm hungry all of a sudden.

I have completely given up trying to manage my cats.

They do whatever they want and I don't even bother trying to restrict their behavior because now that they're old and cranky (like me) they just don't care. About anything. Fortunately, there are some rules that have been in place since they were small so they don't misbehave because it's engrained into them. Things like scratching furniture or jumping up on the kitchen counters. Sometimes they "forget," but it's rare because they still remember aluminum foil covering the countertops and sticky tape on the furniture legs.

But then there's the dining table.

For whatever reason, they categorically refuse to stop jumping on top of it. No matter how many times I shoo them off, they will hop back on... sometimes minutes after they've been removed. No idea why this is one of those things that they're so intent on doing, but nothing seems to work that keeps them off.

So now I just put a towel on the table and that's that...

If I ever need to actually use the table, I still scrub it down with anti-bacterial scrub... but the fact that Jake and Jenny always stay on the towel when they're on the table is enough to keep me from losing my mind.

So I'm chalking this up as a win.

Even though everybody knows I'm taking the L here.