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moon_custafer

Just posted another short chapter of Gentleman of the Shade.

daisyface posting in

fandomcalendar

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Current Mood: grateful

olivermoss

I've photographed his work a LOT over the past several years, and yesterday I saw him in the wild... or rather leaving his new workshop location. I wanted to repost some pictures of I've taken of his stuff over the years for context, but that's the downside to my main photography folder being 34,154 Files in 517 Folders. That's far from every photo I've ever taken, only select photos go in. I have spent time organizing it, but... not enough?

Anyway, you can get his vibe from these pics I think.

Where the magic happens:

He runs the sticker, keychain and pin exchanges across Portland. He did the Crypto-zoo, Dinotopia, The Portland Aquarium and runs the Wonderwood Springs D&D/RPG themed cafe in St Johns. I know I've posted about that place and can picture the images, but I cannot find them right now. I might need to start a dedicated Mike Bennett folder. Originally known online as Regional Memesmith, he is part of the fabric of the Portland arts scene.

( Wait, remembering his old psued jogged a memory )

queervanilla posting in

drawesome

Title: Lovecore MJV

Artist:

queervanilla

Rating: G

Fandom: Arcane

Character(s): Mel Medarda, Jayce Talis, Viktor

Content Notes: CSP

theatlantic_health_feed

Posted by Nicholas Florko

https://www.theatlantic.com/health/2026/02/trumprx-prescription-drug-prices/685919/?utm_source=feed

Nothing about TrumpRx is subtle. When you open up the government’s new online drugstore, the first thing you see is a banner with giant text: “Find the world’s lowest prices on prescription drugs.” Launched last night, TrumpRx allows Americans to purchase certain medications at steep discounts—either by buying them directly from the drug company or by showing a coupon at the pharmacy. “Thanks to President Trump, the days of Big Pharma price-gouging are over,” the website says.

TrumpRx does make a compelling case that the president has mounted an extraordinary effort to stop pharmaceutical companies from ripping off Americans. The website offers discounts on some 40 drugs—the result of months of negotiations between drugmakers and the Trump administration. In a press conference announcing TrumpRx yesterday, Trump boasted that “16 of the 17 largest pharmaceutical companies have signed agreements” to list their drugs on the website. “And the other one is coming,” he added. The Trump administration was able to negotiate a nearly 85 percent discount on a trio of drugs typically used as part of IVF. Americans can also buy Wegovy, the wildly popular weight-loss injection, for as little as $199 a month, a fraction of the original list price.

But these are the exceptions. Most Americans looking for their prescription drugs won’t find that many deals on the site. Health care is complicated already, and TrumpRx apparently does not always offer the cheapest or best option. Those with insurance—some 85 percent of Americans—typically will get a better deal using the coverage they already have than they would paying out of pocket on TrumpRx. More than three-quarters of Americans with commercial insurance are eligible to pay $20 or less for a month’s supply of Xeljanz, a rheumatoid-arthritis drug. But customers paying cash via TrumpRx will still shell out more than $1,500.

[Read: Trump’s Ozempic deal has a major flaw]

Even people without insurance may be able to find better prices in some cases. Consider Protonix, a drug from Pfizer used to treat acid reflux. TrumpRx offers the drug for just over $200—a 55 percent discount from its typical $447. But what the website does not explain is that there’s a much cheaper, generic version of Protonix on the market (but not available through TrumpRx). According to GoodRx, a drug-discount website similar to TrumpRx, the generic version can be purchased for less than $10. The same is true for Pristiq, an antidepressant. Consumers can buy the drug for $200 on TrumpRx or get the generic via GoodRx for a tenth of the price. Patients going through financial hardships can also sometimes qualify for charity programs, which subsidize their prescriptions.

The big winners of yesterday’s announcement seem to be not patients, but drug companies. The Trump administration got drugmakers to the negotiating table last year by writing letters to the companies threatening to “deploy every tool in our arsenal to protect American families from continued abusive drug pricing practices.” Drugmakers were able to turn the threat into a PR opportunity: When Pfizer cut a deal to participate in the program, the company’s CEO, Albert Bourla, was brought to the West Wing, where Trump called the drug company “one of the greatest in the world.”

Drug companies have also successfully protected their ability to charge whatever they please for some of their biggest moneymakers. Yesterday, Trump claimed that the website includes discounts for “dozens of the most commonly used prescription drugs,” but many of the pharmaceutical industry’s best-selling products—some of which also are among their more expensive offerings—are absent from the website. Take Keytruda, Merck’s cancer drug that was the world’s best seller until it was recently surpassed by the weight-loss and diabetes injection tirzepatide: That drug retails for roughly $12,000 for a three-week course of treatment, and it is missing from TrumpRx. Of the top 10 best-selling prescription drugs in 2024, only one—Ozempic—is listed on TrumpRx.

TrumpRx may become better with age. A White House press release from December named multiple additional drugs that are supposed to be included in TrumpRx but are not. The drugmaker Gilead Sciences, the White House touted in the press release, will sell one of its hepatitis-C medications for about $2,400 rather than its original asking price of nearly $25,000. Kush Desai, a White House spokesperson, told me in an email that only five companies’ drugs have been added to the TrumpRx website so far. In its negotiations, the administration has also secured commitments from drugmakers that when they launch new drugs, they will not charge Americans more than they charge individuals in similar nations, which has the potential to dramatically lower the prices Americans pay for new medicines. (It’s still unclear, however, if all of those new drugs will also be available on TrumpRx.)

For Americans who find discounts on TrumpRx, the platform is likely to make a meaningful difference in their lives. It’s addressing, in its so-far-limited ways, a persistent problem in American life. That said, Trump has claimed before to have provided Americans with real relief at the pharmacy counter. During his first term, the president said that seniors would soon receive $200 discount cards in the mail that they could bring to the pharmacy to help defray the high costs of their drugs. The cards never showed up. This time, the downloadable coupons, at least, are real. They are branded with a golden eagle holding a TrumpRx ribbon in its talons.

https://www.theatlantic.com/health/2026/02/trumprx-prescription-drug-prices/685919/?utm_source=feed

raven

the inevitable daemon AU, omgggg.

your curious body sitting on the shore (5481 words) by raven
Fandom: Heated Rivalry (TV)
Relationships: Shane Hollander/Ilya Rozanov
Characters: Shane Hollander, Ilya Rozanov, Yuna Hollander, Rose Landry
Additional Tags: Alternate Universe, Alternate Universe - Daemons

It’s not just that Ilya’s daemon is impressive. Like… a wolf. A fucking wolf. Yeah, Shane is impressed by that. It's that hockey players shouldn’t have daemons at all.

kaberett

The context is Simone Giertz's Incomplete White Puzzle, which A got me partly to troll me and partly because they thought I'd enjoy it and partly because getting the bundle of all three puzzles gets you 20% off individual list prices.

Current status: 105/"500" pieces in their final positions, plus another 57 no longer singletons. I have several semi-sorted categories including (in the halves of the box) "could plausibly have come from a reasonable puzzle" and "bullshit", and (on the table) Swoopy Bullshit, Offset Noses, Weirdly Straight, Multi-Nose Bullshit, and Featureless Curves.

( THOUGHTS )

I am having a very pleasant and soothing time, and I am trying to break up the hyperfocus by instituting a rule of Get Up And Do One Unit Of Something Else After Every (Contiguous) Piece Placed, and yes that is me rules-lawyering after the fact...

likealighthouse posting in

fandom_on_dw

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loganberrybunny

Public

Bullseye! (1990)

Good grief, this is a mess. A story about a pair of chancers and a pair of nuclear physicists, both played by Michael Caine and Roger Moore. At the very least you'd have thought a film teaming up those two might have had some old-school charm about it. And it does – occasionally – with Moore in particular giving some nice, sub-Bond one-liners. There are some nice shots of Inveraray in the second half, too. But for the most part Bullseye! is a confusing, overstuffed, and worst of all unfunny mess. Sizeable chunks of it could have come from the less amusing end of mid-1970s British comedy, including an agonisingly smutty scene about dogs having sex. That this was directed by that abusive bastard Michael Winner does not surprise me. ★½

Current Mood: disappointed

lydamorehouse

The news continues to be not great... and hopeful, all at once.

ICE is supposedly shipping some 700 of its roughnecks off to other parts of the country, but if anything they seem to be sending the slackers away? The ones who are making their quotas seem to still be on the ground and out in force.

The mutual aid folks I work for, the Food Communists, had one of their deliverers get boxed in by ICE vehicles on Wednesday, demanding to know where they thought they were going with all those groceries and where did all that come from anyway? The driver apparently made oblique noises about having come from a food distribution warehouse and the ICE agents said, "You mean that church over there?" clearly indicating the church basement that my folks operate out of. And, then, apparently, getting their lines directly out of the villain's playbook, the ICE guys added, "Shame if anything were to happen to that church." Then they threatened to dump all the groceries the next time they spotted this guy. The Food Communists are keeping (and I am not inflating this number) 13,000 households fed. If that network went dark, people would suffer.

That threat happened on Wedensday afternoon. When Mason and I wandered in for our usual shift on Thursday we were told to go away until later in the day in order to keep the numbers of volunteers low so that everyone could be protected. The organizer there was really shaken by the threat and was wearing a bulletproof vest. By Friday (today), I saw some activity at the church as I was driving home from the mosque. Y'all you'll never guess what I saw! The Food Communists were being visibly protected by VETERANS FOR PEACE. This is a bedfellow in the revolution I would not have predicted, but here we are.

As I've started saying, "Worst timeline; best people."

Meanwhile, at the mosque today we all heard from another organizer that apparently the Goyim Defense League, actual Neo-Nazis, have rolled into Midway and, last night, apparently, stabbed one of the peaceful protestors at the Bridge Brigrade (which is what we call the loose collection of people who pick a random highway overpass bridge to hold up signs on) two blocks of my house, at Aldine. The protestor is okay? But, STABBED. JFC. The irony, of course, is that even though a lot of the sentiment is "F*ck ICE," around here I would say that a good 75%-85% of the signs say things like "We love our immigrant neighbors" and "ICE Out, Love in." Not sure why the antisemites have a particular beef with the anti-ICE people, but maybe they think we're all being funded by someone from one of their conspiracy theories. Who knows. F*ck those f*ckers. Also NOT WELCOME here.

Speaking of my mosque duty, I have finally personally been handed a heart-shaped donut by someone who was driving around doing nice things for the protectors. The mutual love here is really something special, y'all. It is life giving. In part because it's so random and so loving. This person was wearing a hijab and so perhaps she was especially doing nice things for folks in front of mosques or other Somali-immigrant places, but I wouldn't swear to it. She seemed like she had a car full of donuts and was just handing them out to people she saw protecting, which is so 100% Minnesota's response to this crisis. She was so pleased to be helping us help others. Like, so many smiles. So many thank you, no THANK YOUs getting bandied about. It was delightful. And given that I spotted my second ever "definitely ICE with those bandanas over their faces" vehicle, a really, really welcome bit of joy among all the fear and tension.

This part is fully difficult to explain to people not from around here. Like, you don't understand the random, chaotic, yet somehow fully organized nature of this resistance.... and how much goddamn love is going into every moment of it. The Veterans for Peace showed up for the Food Communists! Like, within two days!! And it feels like for every stabbing or act of shitty Nazism, twenty thousand more people are haphazardly driving around and handing out hot cocoa and donuts to people with whistles (an exaggeration, surely, but it is absolutely HOW IT FEELS on the ground.) Sure, one guy flipped us off, but the the amount of support and genuine acts of kindness outnumber the bullshit a thousand fold.

I believe we will win. I believe we will win because this community is standing strong and continues to grow and is motivated not by hatred or greed, but by LOVE and kindness and community. When those sh*theads realize that their bonuses aren't forthcoming, their health care will never actually kick in, and their paychecks bounce, their motivation will evaporate. We will still be here keeping our neighbors safe. We'll still be making cookies for each other and feeding our hungry and sheltering our vunerable and singing.

Speaking of, I have to tell you one other crazy thing.

People actually now have forms they give each other in case they go to a high-risk protest or an event where they think they might be arrested or detained. Our neighbors came over last night with one and a set of keys to their apartment. This form is terrifying, you all. It says things on it like, "If you don't hear from this person by ___ time, contact the following people..." I felt extremely honored to be handed this responsibility, but holy crap. What is this timeline? How are we in a place where my literal neighbors have to hand me a list of who they were with and who should take care of their cats in case they are disappeared?

Of course, we had this solemn exchange of information and what did I say when they were leaving? "Have a good time!" (God, I felt stupid.) Also, the "speaking of" of all this is that I believe they were headed to what we colloquially call "band practice" here in the Twin Cities. Band practice is the folks who set up outside of hotels that are hosting ICE personel and make as much noise as possible all night long. Every grain of sand in the gears, my friend. Every grain of sand.

injustice to one

A tiny sign on a stick no larger than a chopstick with the words, "Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere...whatever affects one directly, affects all indirectly."

disneydream06

February 6th...

The Guy Who Invented

Knock-Knock Jokes

Should Have Gotten

The No-Bell Prize.

lauradi7dw

https://stopicetoday.com/

osprey_archer

Although Lieutenant Hornblower is the second book chronologically in the Hornblower series, it was one of the later books written in the series. So, although the narrator is in fact Lieutenant Bush rather than Hornblower himself, it is very much a Hornblower book, which has the presumably unintentional effect of making Bush sound absolutely obsessed with Hornblower.

Oh, sure, he’s constantly running down Hornblower’s appearance (he looks like a scarecrow! He looked like he dressed in the dark and forgot to straighten his clothes!)... but that just shows he’s extremely aware of Hornblower’s appearance, as he rarely comments on how anyone else looks. He stares at Hornblower’s beautiful, skillful, fascinating hands (yes, he actually describes them as fascinating), and wonders if admiring a junior lieutenant smacks of French equalitarianism. He watches Hornblower drink a bucket of water from the well, which sluices down his chin and soaks his white shirt, and “The very sight of him was enough to make Bush, who had already had one drink from the well, feel consumed with thirst all over again.”

I mean yes they did just complete a sneak attack during which no one had a drink in the tropical heat for at least 12 hours, but also WOW. That’s what seeing Hornblower in a wet shirt does to a man, huh!

And then Bush is wounded, and the last thing he remembers before he blacks out is Hornblower’s pleading, tender voice… his gentle hands… the feeling of being safe and comforted by Hornblower’s presence… And once he’s in hospital on land, Hornblower brings him an entire basket of tropical fruit, and Bush is so bowled over he barely manages a “Thank you,” and then they just gaze at each other, which, let’s be real, is probably Hornblower’s preferred love language: Significant Looks.

Then later on Hornblower gets appointed captain, and Bush is so thrilled and so drunk that he ends the night stumbling down the hall, both arms around Hornblower’s neck, bellowing “FOR HE’S A JOLLY GOOD FELLOW” at the top of his lungs as Hornblower helps him to bed. One presumes that Forester simply cut out before Bush dragged Hornblower in for a sloppy drunken kiss and Hornblower patted him awkwardly on the shoulder and fled.

So yes, all the people who recced Hornblower on the grounds that it is very slashy are 100% right. Amazing. This may in fact be the high point of slashiness for the series, as it seems unlikely that Hornblower POV is ever going to be quite as obsessed with Bush as Bush is with Hornblower (the series after all is not called Lieutenant Bush), but we shall see.

Oh, as for the actual plot, ( spoilers )

cosmolinguist

Today's Teddywalk took us a slightly unusual way -- I let him choose, within reason. He didn't spend as long sniffing the grass triangle as before, and afterward when I wanted to drag him more directly back toward his house he scampered off the other way. This took us to a tree-lined residential street where he decided to poop next to one of the trees just as a man parked his land barge just behind us and the kids that got out of it were entertained by this free show.

This route also took us past a school where, even though it was nearing 5 o'clock, kids were going toward the school, with their grownups. They kinda looked like they were wearing pajamas? Some were in bathrobes or oodies. Some seemed to carry pillows or soft toys. One was almost hidden behind a Stitch that must have been fully half her size. It was adorable.

I had a pretty good day otherwise too.

Work was oddly satisfying.

A bunch of things happened to coincide today: I presented my new train report twice, first to a panel of subject-matter experts and accessibility advocates that I'm on, where people were very kind about it (especially as it was at the end of an hour and a half meeting that some people had to leave early and/or thought was only an hour long; one made sure to apologize for leaving halfway through but told me he'd read the report and it was good, which was very sweet).

Then in the afternoon I presented it to a group of lived-experience campaigners, a group I attended back when I was a volunteer who didn't have this job yet. They did their usual thing of wanting to vent their spleens on any tangentially-related topic, but I'm used to that and I kinda love it. Afterward, my colleague who runs these meetings messaged me to thank me and say she appreciates that I always handle the questions so well. I didn't think I'd done anything special! But despite that (or actually because of it!) this was really nice to hear.

And as well as feeling particularly competent with the different audiences my work is for, I also had a quick one-to-one(ish) with my manager which indirectly addressed the stuff I've been stressing about lately and where seemed much happier than I'm used to hearing with the work that I have done in the last year and the stuff that's coming up this year.

It's funny because the other day, on our way to the theater, D pointed out where transgym yoga had moved to: one of those "not actually far away but hard for me to find/get to on a bus" places. So I actually looked at yoga on the transgym website and not only was it on this Friday (it's every other week), but it was back at its old location! My hips are so much happier now, and it'll be good for my brain too.

And now, after a week that was really truly about a month long, it's the weekend! We have basically no plans, and the fascists aren't even yelling at the hotel this Sunday!

So many good things.

dorchadas

So Laila spent some time at the grandparents over the weekend, which was good because I got a nasty cold that knocked me out most of the weekend. I had meant to spend it cleaning up some of the post-game content in Clair Obscur, but what actually happened is that I started dragging on Friday night, woke up Saturday morning and helped pass off Laila to Poppa and Nana. Then after lunch, with no energy, I thought "Oh I'll just go lie down for twenty minutes or so, then I'll feel better."

What happened is that I fell asleep for two hours and then when

sashagee checked, I had a fever. So I spent the next couple days recovering and not accomplishing any of things I wanted to get done while Laila was out of town, spent yesterday and today working from home, and now when my nose has finally stopped running my throat is hurting and it's not from too much coughing. Sigh.

That meme I saw was right. I did used to think I had a good immune system before I became an abba, but it was just that I didn't have anyone around who would roughly cough directly into my open mouth. Emoji Uncertain ~ face

Current Mood: sick
Current Music: Nothing

merrileemakes

So it's been over a month since I posted any thing crafty. I've certainly been crafting, I just haven't had any big finishes. I often think of my crafting approach as "kicking the can down the road."Lots of little steps, sometimes without significant progress.
( So here's the cans I've been kicking. )

Current Mood: accomplished
Current Music: Florence + the Machine - The End of Love (but playing in my head for some reason

xkcd_feed

https://xkcd.com/3204/

Staplers are actually in Pseudosuchia, making them more closely related to crocodiles than to dinosaurs.

https://xkcd.com/3204/

elayna

I got a spam comment on a fic. It says things that seem nice but make no sense, and that make no actual references to the characters or anything that truly shows the commenter read my story. It then encourages me to check out the commenter's instagram/discord name. I guess it's preferable that it's a nice one rather than a critical, nasty one, as I've seen some people get?

But I'm just... what is the point of this? Okay, well, to drive engagement to an insta account. I guess you set those bots going and they go and go and so maybe you get several new people checking out your insta? IDK, I just don't relate to the whole 'click' culture. It just seems lies and deception, and we don't need more of that in this world.

It is a registered user, which surprises me, but every time I've seen warnings about AO3 being scraped by bots, there's always the suggestion to lock all your fic to registered users, and I've thought, can't a person just log in the bot as a registered user? And then let it go scraping away? I don't really understand much about how these things work (and admittedly don't really want to).

Anyway, off to figure out how to report a comment as spam, a new task! Yay?

extrapenguin posting in

space_swap

Sign-ups are open! Sign-ups end Sun 15 Feb 17:00 CET (in your timezone | countdown)

Note: AO3 has introduced a setting to opt out of non-assignment gifts. If your account was created after 1 Feb 2022, it has been enabled by default. Note that opting out of non-assignment gifts will make it impossible to receive treats, even if they are posted to an exchange you're signed up for, as well as make certain (rare) issues harder for me to resolve. If possible, I highly suggest you enable non-assignment gifts for the duration of the exchange or send me an e-mail (extrapenguin at gmx dot com) if you cannot so that I can do some workarounds. If you have concerns regarding specific potential gifters, please contact me.

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Fandoms must be unique.

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If you are given a gift that contains a DNW listed in your sign-up, you are eligible for a replacement. Gifts will be randomly spot-checked as they come in and dealt with if necessary, but should a DNW-containing gift make its way to you, please contact the mod at extrapenguin at gmx dot com. You may also contact me if you suspect (through e.g. tag shaking) that your gift will contain a DNW. In cases where a gift contains a DNW due to unclear phrasing of the DNW, we will err on the side of the author. DNWs apply to the gift, not its metadata. A creator is free to tag as they best think describes the work.

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otw_news_feed

Posted by Lute

https://www.transformativeworks.org/ao3-celebrates-10-million-registered-users/

https://www.transformativeworks.org/?p=278886

What do the country of Portugal, the city of Seoul, and the Archive of Our Own (AO3) have in common? They are all home to more than 10 million people! That’s right: AO3 has surpassed 10 million registered users this month! We at the Organisation for Transformative Works (OTW) are delighted to share this incredible milestone with you.

Even as the community is growing year by year, the active exchange of creations and ideas between fans remains as a cornerstone of fan culture. Whether it’s gifting each other fanfic, recording a podfic of your favorite story, or putting together a reclist of fics—no fandom thrives without the myriad ways fans share their passion with one another. In today’s world, where ideas are just one more commodity, and content is curated for maximum revenue, it’s more important than ever to appreciate and celebrate these aspects of fan spaces.

One way to let other fans know you appreciate the love and hard work they pour into their creations is commenting on their work. In celebration of this milestone, we have prepared a Bingo all about comments! Below you can find the bingo cards in both a square and vertical format.

10 Million AO3 Users Commenting Bingo 2026

You can fill out as many bingo squares as you want—the more comments, the merrier! Let us know on this post or on social media which Bingos you scored.

Happy commenting, and a huge thank you to everyone who helped us reach this milestone!

https://www.transformativeworks.org/ao3-celebrates-10-million-registered-users/

https://www.transformativeworks.org/?p=278886

olivermoss

* There is now an easter egg on google.com if you search for Heated Rivalry. Rachel's reaction.

* There is going to be a Baldur's Gate 3 TV show! *thinks about this for three seconds* Yeah, there was talk of this when the game was blowing up and everyone agreed it would be a bad idea. Also, it's a continuation so it will be based on one of probably hundreds of possible end-game states and this show will be based on one of the popular ones. And

spoiler title

Astarian is going to be either dead, evil or unable to travel. His non-evil ending is staying in the Underdark because he becomes vulnerable to the sun again. Rather than a game that is about exploring the choices you like, popular or not, it will be tied to what will sell the best. One of the appeals of games is not being tied to that. Even if you would choose to be a male Tav romancing Shadowheart, you are still choosing it not being fed it.

lsanderson

ICE

‘You’re not going to investigate a federal officer’
It doesn’t happen often, but local law enforcement can arrest and charge federal agents. Legal experts say there’s a moral obligation to at least try to hold federal immigration officers accountable when they violate the Constitution and the law.
By Andy Mannix, Melissa Sanchez and Nicole Foy / ProPublica
https://www.minnpost.com/national/2026/02/youre-not-going-to-investigate-a-federal-officer/

Sahan Journal has the story of Minnesotans who have been transferred to ICE detention centers in Texas and released with no way to return home. “In recent weeks, lawyers have filed a flurry of successful court challenges compelling the government to release their clients, but that has left an increasing number of Minnesotans stranded outside detention facilities far from home,” they report. “In some cases, ICE has refused to return identification cards or work permits to those released from detention, attorneys say.”
https://sahanjournal.com/immigration/ice-detainees-stranded-after-release/

Man arrested in early-morning Minneapolis federal raid is charged with cyberstalking
The 6 a.m. raid, which involved at least 11 officers, took place at Eat Street Flats in the Whittier neighborhood. The man arrested doxxed a “pro-ICE individual,” according to a criminal complaint.
by Joey Peters
https://sahanjournal.com/public-safety/federal-raid-kyle-wagner-detained-whittier-minneapolis/ ( Read more... )

prisca posting in

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lotesse

If there was ever any doubt that the US Republican party are racists, let it end now.

thewayne

The internal classified version was started in 1962 as The National Basic Intelligence Factbook. It was a resource that gave you very detailed information about countries around the world: form of government, economic information, population and make-up, etc. Very useful information. It went public in 1971 as the World Factbook and later joined the World Wide Web in 1997 in an unclassified version. It was available between '71 and '97 in print form and on CD.

And now it's gone. Any page for any country that you may have had linked now redirects to the closure notice. Everything's now inaccessible. Of course, you can still look into it via archive.org, but the information was updated regularly when the site was live, and it will now grow increasingly stale.

No reason given. The CIA was subject to the same chainsaw-trimming that most other government agencies were given courtesy of DOGE and the Muskbrats. We also have the intense administration's dislike of facts. Either or both could have contributed to its demise.

But with a little luck, in a possibly truthier future, it could be resurrected. There's no doubt that the CIA found the resource useful, so it may again become available to the public in a better tomorrow.

https://www.engadget.com/big-tech/the-cia-stops-publishing-the-world-factbook-184419024.html

https://www.cia.gov/stories/story/spotlighting-the-world-factbook-as-we-bid-a-fond-farewell/

https://news.slashdot.org/story/26/02/05/187252/cia-has-killed-off-the-world-factbook-after-six-decades

EDIT: added Slashdot link.

disneydream06

sonofgodzilla

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Current Mood: amused
Current Location: somewhere
Current Music: Sakimoto Hitoshi - Staring into the Void

bookscorpion posting in

common_nature

I took a bunch of really nice photos of the crow army today - with the light reflecting from the snow, the details of their feathers come out so beautifully. Look at how blue/purple the big feathers are, edged by black, compared to the dark black of the smaller head feathers.

This is the boldest of them. He stayed juuuust out of arm's reach but didn't mind me kneeling down and stretching my arm out at him. He miiiight be Mr Roadside Pair but I don't think so, I think he is smaller.,,,

joshreadscomics_feed

Posted by Josh

https://joshreads.com/2026/02/metapost-the-polar-vortex-will-continue-but-the-comments-offer-some-relief/

https://joshreads.com/?p=48123

Comics Curmudgeon readers! Do you love this blog and yearn for a novel written by its creator? Well, good news: Josh Fruhlinger's The Enthusiast is that novel! It's even about newspaper comic strips, partly. Check it out!

Warm your icy mitts/heart with this week’s top comment:

“Of course Tildy’s confused. Your kids should by all rights be named Carter and Mason, or Hunter and Liam, or something a little more of the time. Sure, James, John, and Michael are all classics, but we are in our Braden, Jaden, Caden era.” –Old School Allie Cat

The runners up will have you chuckling, which hopefully will help generate some body heat:

“And at last, the conflict is revealed: Rex Morgan is mildly inconvenienced!” –TheDiva

“Who has it rougher, the woman feeding her husband as if he’s a baby, or the two Foreign Legionnaires whose only available entertainment is to eavesdrop on this nauseating process? Who cares? None of them have it as rough as us, the readers of the comic strip about it.” –Peanut Gallery

“It would be kind of badass if, after a century-plus of lighthearted adventures together, Spark Plug actually killed Barney Google.” –Joe Blevins

“I like how Smitty’s defense seems to be just yelling ‘INNOCENT!’ dramatically at each and every question he’s asked. He knows that when dealing with animals, concise, repeated messages are key.” –pugfuggly

“Slick Smitty is accused of stealing milk. Which of these witnesses was not in the industrial milking facility near the school, tethered to machines to provide the youth with fresh milk? Which witness was not in their assigned place, making eggs? Because there’s something suspicious in a citizen that’s not providing according to their abilities.” –Voshkod

“Pluggers are pretty sure they have the acerbic charm of a Bill Murray, but not like an artsy, Wes Anderson-era Bill Murray, they’re not into that. And I guess not in his SNL-through-Ghostbusters years, a little too high energy for a plugger’s tastes. Pluggers are very fond of Garfield 2: A Tale of Two Kitties though. Did you know they go to England in that one? Ha ha, imagine, Garfield! In England! [turning off the alarm and falling back asleep while chuckling] I bet they don’t even make lasagna the same there.” –Dan

“It’s a trick question. The answer is that none of them testified, in any order. As is evident from the depiction in the first panel, the prospective witnesses weren’t sequestered before testifying. Defense counsel thus objected to the proffer of any of them as witnesses because they were all together, able to discuss one another’s testimony, and the Court struck them all from the witness list. Without any witnesses to call, Slylock lost his case, which he would have done, anyway, because he disrespected the dignity of the Court inasmuch as he and his sidekick wore hats into the courtroom. The moral here, of course, is that crime pays, and now Slick Smitty is free to continue his life of unrestrained lactic kleptomania.” –Bob Tice

“Dennis the Head Floating Above His Shoulders Menace works for me.” –I’m Not Cthulhu, But I Play Him On TV

“Miss Buxley and Miss Blips are named after their boobs, but it is nice to see that despite their different boob sizes, they band together against the common enemy, i.e. their superior. Truly the army is amazing in building comradeship, unity, and cohesion!” –Ettorre

“I mean, I still don’t want to be around him, which is why I’m here with you.” –Rosstifer

“General Halftrack is fantasizing that when Miss Buxley goes to ‘pick up something for him,’ it means she’ll be stopping at Victoria’s Secret and modeling some sexy items of clothing in the office. What it really means is that she’ll go to the Base Supply Center for a box of pens, because that, even though she’s faking the need for it, would actually be a useful part of her job. Especially since Halftrack is old and was never even issued a computer, so he spends all day waving big pieces of paper around.” –BigTed

“Ian used to shout and grumble and be so condescending. But now I can do things like get this botched Michael Jackson-esque nose job and he doesn’t even say a word. It’s great!” –2+2=7

“Poor Mary, faced with an intractable conflict between two of her faves (enabling ridiculous behavior and gassing up terrible men).” –matt w

“I guess Josh was wrong yesterday — the pie and the salad were both for Mary. Toby’s lunch consists solely of a gin and tonic on an empty stomach (the slice of lemon counts as her calories treat for the day). How else do you think she a) stays so slim and b) comes out with ideas like ‘Should I divorce my husband because my bird ate all his stuff?’” –Schroduck

“This entire family shouting match and the subsequent murder/suicide could have been avoided wth decaf.” –Handsome Harry Backstayge, Idol of a Million Other Women

“Every Robin Hood film needs to spend the first half on an origin story, and the one in Mother Goose and Grimm seems as good as any.” –Gerry Quinn

“Real sloppy work from whoever did the spray job. They need to take a note from whoever did that sharp little Cool-S. Craft matters and bigger does not always equal better.” –Charterstone: Dune

“Leroy doesn’t work on that floor, is the thing. That guy has no idea who this odd, squat man talking to him is. Leroy LIVES for the chaos!” –A Grave Mind

“Sir Rodney is just following the orders of the King’s Privy Council.” –nescio

Remember: If you want an ad-free version of this site sent to you every day via email, for $3 a month you can become a Comics Curmudgeon newsletter subscriber! And if you never want to see banner ads on this site, and want to get cool comment-editing features to boot, for the same low price you can become a Comics Curmudgeon website subscriber! You can get each day’s post ad-free via Patreon if that’s your style! And if you just want to give me money directly, you can put some scratch in my tip jar! Thanks to all for your support and readership!

https://joshreads.com/2026/02/metapost-the-polar-vortex-will-continue-but-the-comments-offer-some-relief/

https://joshreads.com/?p=48123

larryhammer

I’m an aloha shirt kind of guy. Not all of my wardrobe is brightly floral—I need a few more subdued patterns for less informal occasions, such as starting work in an office where I haven’t confirmed aloha is acceptable business casual wear. But a fair number are, most of them tasteful.

This is mostly by temperament—they signal (though let me asterisk that * ) a laid-back temperament, which is both true and helps me through interactions with strangers. Mostly, as there’s also a practical component. I’ve mentioned this a couple times, but I come across IRL as taller than I do online: I’m 6'4" / 193cm. Finding men’s short-sleeve shirts that are long enough for my torso to stay tucked in is a challenge. (Paradoxically, it’s easier with long-sleeve shirts, as “long” sizes is a thing for those.) Aloha shirts, however, are designed to not be tucked in, and indeed look worse that way. Win!

But then there’s that asterisk: * I’m graying enough, both hair and goatee (which last I’ve been keeping for two years now), that I can sometimes be misidentified as a Boomer, and a Boomer in an aloha shirt signals a different temperament than a younger guy in one. I’m lean enough I don’t entirely lean into that stereotype, but still. I’m older Gen X and … touchy … about being mistaken for a Boomer.

The goatee is starting to annoy me in other ways, anyway, so maybe shaving it will help—it has the most white. Or I could, yanno, suck it up and deal. Be laid-back. Just like the shirts claim.

---L.

Subject quote from We Can Work It Out, The Beatles.

hamsterwoman

dreamersdare is hosting a Stuff I Love – Top 10 Edition weekly challenge throughout February, with the first week being media one-shots.

I’m not going to try for a ranked top 10 for this or other weeks, because that way madness lies, but I did want to try to get to a list of 10 things I love that fit the challenge.

I pondered just a free-form list of one-shots of different mediums and genres, but eventually what coalesced is this: a list of standalone SFF fiction. One of the things I really love about SFF is the long series, the magical sagas, multi-volume explorations of worldbuilding, sometimes across real-world decades and in-universe millennia – your Tolkien Legendariums, your Earthseas, your Dragaeras, your Vokosigan Sagas. So it’s particularly notable when I enjoy a SFF standalone, which manages to pack that worldbuilding and that sensawunda into a single piece. Sometimes even quite a short one, because I included short stories, novellas, and novelettes in scope of this.

In no particular order, and selected by starting with a considerably longer list and picking things from it until I felt like I’d picked all the right ones.

( top 10 )

wildeabandon

I got my exam results yesterday, and they were slightly disappointing, in the "virtually anyone would be fucking delighted, but they were all on the low end of what I was expecting" sense of the word disappointing. I got 15/20 in Catechetics, 16/20 in Anthropology, 17/20 in Psalms & Prophets, and 18/20 in Hebrew II and Ugaritic. The first two are entirely understandable - I wasn't particularly keen on either course, and whilst by no means neglecting them completely, I didn't put in a particularly high level of effort. I'm happy enough with the 18s. They were both challenging courses, and 18 is a bloody good mark.

The one that's bugging me is the Psalms though. I thought I understood the material well, and that I'd had some interesting and insightful things to say. I know that I got 18/20 in the paper that makes up half the mark, which means that I only got 15-16/20 in the exam. Hardly the end of the world, but it's the only one where I don't understand why I didn't do better. I've emailed the prof to ask for feedback, so with luck I'll get something useful. (ETA: Apparently marks get rounded down, not up - I got 8/10 and 9/10 in the two exam questions, and the 8 was because he had to prompt me a couple of times, and since at least one of those time he prompted me for the thing I was about to say anyway I am now feeling a lot less bothered by the overall mark.)

One result though which is positive in a sense is that my overall grade is now almost guaranteed. My average is currently 87%. The top grade boundary is an average of 90%, which had seemed in reach before these results, but would now require me to get 20/20 in all but one of my remaining courses (and 19/20 in that), which isn't really plausible. The grade boundary below is an average of 85%, and whilst the fact that there are just more numbers between 0 and 87 than between 87 and 100 means that there's more scope for my grade to be dragged down than up, I would have to do quite a bit worse than I have been for that to happen. Anyway, the sense that there's not a lot that I can do to change my overall grade means that I can concentrate more on learning for the sake of learning, which in the long term is almost certainly better than chasing grades.

prettygoodword

arboricide (ah-BOR-i-said) - n., an herbicide intended to kill trees or shrubs; (rare) the killing of a tree.

Or as the OED puts it, "the wanton destruction of trees." In memory of the large pine that, until yesterday, stood between our house and the neighbor's, shading us from the southwest. Its destruction was not wanton, however, as it like all too many pines in our neighborhood was dying (bark beetles). Coined in the 1890s from Latin roots arbor, tree + -cidium, killing (from caedere, to cut/kill).

---L.

princessofgeeks

( You're about to view content that the journal owner has marked as possibly inappropriate for anyone under the age of 18. )

Current Mood: awake

js_thrill

Yesterday's song was "The Recognition Scene" and today's is "Third Snow Song"

Watch on YouTube

The first song is titled after the scene in a tragedy where the protagonist sees that they are stuck in a tragedy. The tone of the song certainly works with that reference. The second song is about Darnielle experiencing actual* cold weather as someone who had grown up chiefly in warmer, sunnier parts of California.

Both songs are nice, but I don't have much to say about either.

*Those of us familiar with winter in places other than Portland, Oregon, may question whether this really constituted "actual cold weather"

joshreadscomics_feed

Posted by Josh

https://joshreads.com/2026/02/working-kind-of-for-the-weekend/

https://joshreads.com/?p=48119

Wizard of Id, 2/6/26

Happy Friday, everyone! What are your weekend plans? Are you thinking about getting extremely high and catapulting some toilets at somebody? Because that appears to be what Sir Rodney is up to in the Wizard of Id.

Gil Thorp, 2/6/26

Or were you thinking about going out and “tagging” a rival high school? If so, you should definitely choose Milford High as your target, as the coach to whom the principal has ominously delegated the task of doing what they must do can’t muster up any epithets stronger than “rats,” with a period, not even an exclamation point.

The Lockhorns, 2/6/26

Leroy! I think most people already know what their payment package will be when they accept an offer of employment. Not everyone is so bad at money as you. This young up-and-comer is right to look at you so warily. Honestly I assume that he’s probably already been warned about you by his other new coworkers. In conclusion, I like the Lockhorns strips about Leroy’s work life because they confirm that, much like his home life, his work life is pretty miserable.

https://joshreads.com/2026/02/working-kind-of-for-the-weekend/

https://joshreads.com/?p=48119