Diary of a Fat Slob: “The topic tonight is the hippies."

Leftovers & Links #58

You’re in a hurry and so am I, so here's a one-word newscast:

Good news:
• Drugs
• Lawsuit

Stupid news:
• Baseball
• Dirt

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If you've always wanted to sell your face in perpetuity for use in manufactured robots, sorry, you’re too late. After receiving 20,000 applications, Promobot will now take a year sifting through the photos.

Also, there’s this.

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Says here, chop suey was considered a gourmet dish in China, but in America it’s widely considered junk food, largely because of La Choy brand canned chop suey.

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“The topic tonight is the hippies,” and those words come from William F Buckley in 1968, so you might think you know what to expect, but Buckley’s guests are Jack Kerouac and Ed Sanders so it’s better than that.

Sanders differentiates himself from the hippies “in that I would have a more radical political solution,” and says smart things every damn time he opens his mouth. He’s angry enough to be alive but never impolite, and by halfway through I wanted to buy him a beer.

Kerouac has already had several — he’s drunk and makes no pretense not to be, interrupting and occasionally making fart noises, sometimes making sense, but often sounding surprisingly Republican.

Allen Ginsberg is in the audience, and Kerouac and Sanders both flash signals and comments at him. Oh, and there’s some other fuddy-duddy in a suit, who’s almost as ordinary and annoying as Buckley.

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This guy got scalped, and survived.

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New York City allows opening of safe illegal drug use sites, first in the nation

Quote: The centers will have staff on hand to administer naloxone to prevent any overdoses and counsel drug users on addiction treatment. Visitors can be provided with sterile paraphernalia for a range of drugs, including ones that are injected, sniffed and smoked; users must bring their own drugs. De Blasio said that local law enforcement have agreed not to police the sites for illegal drug use.

I’m definitely concerned about that last item on the list, but — fingers crossed. Overall, this is long-needed common sense.

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I am pissed off when I see coverage like this, from Associated Press, that says Trump has made “unproven claims” that the 2020 election was stolen.

It's been fifteen months with evidence promised over and over again but never presented. There's no evidence, so these are not “unproven claims.” They’re bullshit. Don’t bullshit me, Associated Press, and don’t help Trump bullshit America.

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Here’s a 25-minute video about Jim Nabors, a/k/a Gomer Pyle, who was every bit as wholesome in real life as he was on TV. Watching it is like getting a big hug from Nabors himself.

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The award-winning “School Portrait” is now ten years old.

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I am not quite sure what to make of this, as the site has no ‘about’ page, but it’s the most comprehensive database of racial slurs I’ve ever seen.

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Instant web page.

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If I can’t say it better than someone else, I’ll let someone else say it:

"In the 48 years since Roe was decided, the Democrats have had ample opportunity to codify the right to an abortion. In that time, they’ve controlled the Senate for 29 years, the House for 29 years and the presidency for 21 years. Instead, many Dems sought to restrict abortion rights, especially for poor women, largely by enacting the Hyde Amendment, which prohibited federal funds for abortions. The Hyde Amendment was first enacted in 1977, only four years after Roe. One of its most enthusiastic co-sponsors: Joe Biden."

—Jeffrey St Clair

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This is unimportant, not worth writing about, and certainly not worth reading about, sorry — but I hate this Lasko space heater so much. We’ve had it for years, and while it's never not worked, it's so stupidly designed it's an eternal frustration.

Annoyance #1: The thermostat turns the heater off and on based on the temperature of the room, but the settings are five degrees apart. You can’t set it for 72°; you must choose between 60°, 65°, 70°, 75°, 80°, and 85°, so whatever setting you choose, you get the Goldilocks Effect: Too hot, then too cool, then just right, then too hot again...

Annoyance #2: The beeps. Touch any button, and it emits a high-pitched 90-decibel beep. Turn it on, beep, set it to oscillate, beep, cycle through the temperature settings, beep beep beep beep. When my wife was with me, either of us unfailingly woke the other with beeps.