Dave Ferguson

You go with what you know.

I spent grad school in a town of 287, in a county of 5,000.

For entertainment once, we drove 30+ miles to the opening of a K-Mart. ;-)

All my kids were readers, but I don't remember going to Pizza Hut much. That might be because there was a small but very good indie pizzeria in the little suburban mall near us.

The kind with holy cards of saints stuck up near the register.

My children remember "dad tax," when I'd take them to McDonald's for lunch after soccer games, and mooch a few fries.

The Eager Reader pizza is the pizza your parents remember best.

My non-lawyer theory has two parts:

1. DHS/ICE/GoonInc has either fired or driven out (consciously or not) at least half the support staff, and virtually none of the attorneys left can create a TOC in Word on their own.

2. No one proofread the filed doc pre-filing.

An orderly line is what we want all day long. As you say, it would be administratively easy.

Back then, early 2000s, we had electronic voting machines, not scannable ballots, but I assume there'd have been an electronic time stamp.

Seems consistent. I chimed in just to say the deadline (at whatever time) is well known, and in our jurisdiction (MO tgomery County MD) when I lived there this was just part of everyday business.

I never had to deal with a court order, though. ;-)

When I was an election worker in Maryland, our materials included an end of line sign (or did it say "last voter?") to give to the last person in line at the designated time.

We'd also station someone near the door to tell latecomers the polls were closed.

"The Commitments," overall feel-good with side helpings of dark humor and wistfulness.

"Doctor Detroit," as good as a bag of Storm Chips on a blustery, cold day.

"Stone of Destiny" 2008 tale of the kidnapping (or rescue) of this Scottish icon from Westminster Abbey.

I can't wait till other tech ghouls launch LLMs that "respond in the STYLE of grammar-nag software."

By the end of the week, you'll need Ken Burns to do a full montage.

They needed better lawyers.

The GOP: The Enemy Within.

To paraphrase a Marshall Dodge line from an episode of "Bert and I," I could take a sharp knife and a piece of knotty pine and whittle a more accurate answer than Gemini gave.

This account is fascinating on so many levels.

The predictive-text genie lies about lying, since it doesn't really understand what it's doing (or, more accurately, not doing)...

He pauses in the stupidest places.

Either he has to tense up mentally to manage any two-or-more syllable word after "the," or else the teleprompter breaks the line before a big word like "bravery" and he can't maintain audio momentum.

Also, it's ironic that the chervil I order online here in Canada comes from... Bart, a UK brand.

It wasn't all that exotic in the elite* environment of Montgomery Village, Maryland.

( * not very damn elite )

Four Trump-weeks equals at least 1 Putin-day, which means this will drag into spring 2027.

I guess. I make my lazy-person Fines Herbes with equal parts chervil, chives, parsley, and tarragon. Like I did this morning while making my omelet.

Browning mushrooms, 4 tsp this, 4 tsp that, shake shke, eggs in, shake pan, 2 more tsp this, that, supply refilled, finish breakfast.

I am still baffled that I have never been able to find that rare, specialized, exotic herb CHERVIL in any grocery store I've been to here in Victoria, BC.

Upty-eight different colors of salt, though.

Oh, you can't snow me, I'm sticking with the humans
I'm sticking with the humans,
I'm sticking with the humans,
No, I sure don't need scabby auto-completions--
I'm sticking with the humans till the day I die.

(Tune: Union Maid)

There once was a union shop that had no use for glop
Like op-ed thoughts praising C-suite bots
Or billionaire blowhards with their A.I. slop.
It stood with the working kind
where your effort builds your mind
And when the venture-cap suits came round
It always stood its ground...

"Your use of the Website may be monitored by Kalshi, and the resultant information may be used in accordance with Kalshi’s Privacy Policy, Member Agreement, Rulebook, and applicable law."

Aha! So in some language or other, "Kalshi" means "HOA."

Well, "accommodate me" is a pretty good capsulization of what Trump thinks "negotiation" means.

I think "Back" is a code name for Bovino.

Back, the fuck up.

Lilibet, meanwhile, finds indie movies for her mom to be in, like a historical comedy about Marguerite Langlois (wife of Abraham Martin, he of the Plains, so it's set in Québec).

Surprise guest star: Sam Neill as Samuel Champlain. Not saying he dallied with Marguerite, but who knows?

Maybe something like the Mac B., Kid Spy books, where the girls fling themselves into things like that cetacean research as they figure out how to get Prince Louis to run away and become a member of the Jamaican parliament (or a surf-shop owner, his secret desire).

I live walking distance from Government House in Victoria, where the Lieutenant Governor (provincial counterpart to the national Governor General) lives. It's a lovely little spot to go for a stroll.

But you've definitely got me thinking...

It's my understanding (I don't study this stuff but my curiousity is roused) that if Charles wanted to remove Andrew from the line of succession (as one political observer put it, the rang [e.g., prince] is but the guinea's stamp), the parliaments of Canada, Australia, etc., would have to agree.

Like, for instance, Charlotte decides she'll run for Queen of Canada. Like a humble pope, she'll settle for a sort of granny flat at the Governor General's residence.

Oh, that's good.

How about: they forge contacts with the 15 realms beyond the seas, so that *none* of them accepts the next hereditary chief of the Britons as *their* monarch.