ShittyBeatlesFCPres

Ugh. More car infrastructure with no bike lanes or pedestrian-friendly sidewalks. Have we learned nothing about urban planning?

Wait, is this [email protected] or another community?

My favorite is new potatoes from a crawfish boil. Second is probably really good potato salad, especially when there’s some gumbo to put on it.

No points for guessing where I’m from.

Also, if any real physicists read this, I am not a crank who is coming up with his own theories. I’m happy to trust that you have done the math and I have my own problems to deal with. Unless I get a bonk on the head, none of you will ever get a letter from me saying I have solved all of physics with 50 pages of gibberish.

I find physics fascinating and sometimes, I definitely feel like I understand certain topics. I took a lot of physics courses in college despite ultimately majoring in something else and I’ve read a bunch of papers and books. I can’t even count the number of YouTube videos I’ve watched from physicists (especially PBS Spacetime, Dr. Don Lincoln on the Fermilab channel, Sixty Symbols, and now Angela Collier).

But I have not done the math. I don’t understand shit. When I talk to a real physicist, I pretty much immediately get reminded of that. It feels like I have the vocabulary words memorized but none of the actual knowledge.

Yeah, I know. I care about Haiti a lot because I’m a New Orleanean and we share a lot of common history and culture. In a lot of ways, Haiti is a bigger priority for me than other places we talk about here.

It can probably wait until Monday. No need to work on a weekend.

I’m also a Linux user who got a MacBook Pro for work reasons and Parallels is nice, especially for Windows VMs. I was also annoyed to find I couldn’t use Virtualbox on Apple silicon and reluctantly bought Parallels. It’s expensive but it has a lot of features and nice touches so I don’t regret the purchase.

Basically, it’s like everything Apple-related where you initially go “Wait, how much does it cost? Fuck that.” But then once you buy it, it’s actually really nice and you don’t feel ripped off. (Or not as ripped off, anyway.)

Not sure if I count as an audiophile but here’s my list o’ stuff I’ve acquired over the years and like the best:

My house had speakers built into the ceiling when I moved in so I have a Denon AVR-S760H amp and play audio through the surround sound with an AppleTV, record player, or whatever other source. (I forget the record player model but it’s just one of the mid-tier Sony ones.) I also have some Sennheiser HD 598 headphones that I love the sound on. They’re open back so not appropriate for travel but if I’m alone and not in the living room, that’s my go-to.

I really like Sennheisers and I eventually splurged on a pair of 4.50 SE over the ear ones for travel. They have noise cancellation and a closed back so they work great on flights or trains. I like them a lot.

I also have some Beats Fit Pros that I use a lot. Most earbuds don’t stay in my ears very well so the little nubbin hook on the Beats Fits is really what prompted that decision but the audio quality ended up being perfectly fine for the form factor. Sometimes, you’re exercising or just listening to a podcast or a work call. They ended up being a good purchase.

It’s a good biosignature but a real smoking gun would be if a planet has intelligent life that’s not always so intelligent. Then, we might detect chlorofluorocarbons or some other synthetic pollutant.

“Well, we detected an alien civilization but their atmosphere is in way worse shape than 1950’s London and they’re 100 light years away. I guess we’ll keep checking and see if they get their act together or not.”

I don’t think we should sensationalize one rabbi talking out his ass but there’s a lot of other data points. Itamar Ben-Gvir (Minister of National Security) and Yoav Gallant (Minister of Defense) say genocidal shit all the time. They’re not random rabbis. South Africa’s case before the ICJ included a lot of direct quotes from leading government officials.

I don’t know anything about this organization — I just found this on Google — but an NGO called Law 4 Palestine apparently has a database that seems to cite sources pretty well. https://law4palestine.org/law-for-palestine-releases-database-with-500-instances-of-israeli-incitement-to-genocide-continuously-updated/

And look: I know that Hamas and probably every other Islamic fundamentalist group’s leadership has said equally awful shit (and worse shit, for that matter). Some of the Israeli quotes came at an extremely traumatic moment. But this is bigger than one rabbi. I don’t think it’s be hard to establish intent if Netanyahu, Ben-Gvir, and Gallant end up getting tried for war crimes.

Edit: I just want to add that most Israelis (and the Jewish diaspora) do not support the current government at this point. They were having mass protests before Hamas attacked.

Hopefully, they don’t find out how much we import from China. Then we’d really be fucked.