Julia Hayden

I just want to be clear here; the cat is only on the alpaca cat stand out of sufference.

Were there preliminaries where no local chicken purveyors made the cut for this chicken battle? Am I to infer the quality of KFC has risen so dramatically as to entirely eclipse long-time demonstrably better chains like Bojangles & Harolds, much less local Cville stalwarts Wayside and Michie Tavern?

For weeks now, a local TV station has been running self-congratulatory ads in which the county name is spelled wrong.

It's either extremely sloppy or they think it's a clever way to distract us from associating the station with Creepy McCreeperson.

It is surreal seeing someone you (used to) know on House Hunters.

People of Crozet: there is a fantastic array of red hot pokers on High Street. Seriously nice planting.

Here's a problem with Google's AI results dominating search results. Before, any errors were the fault of the linked page; now the factual or wrong interpretation errors (FIVE this week) are firmly the fault of Google, thereby dinging their already fraying brand and reputation.

a man is making a surprised face while sitting at a table in a restaurant . Alt: Nathan Fillion starting and stopping to make a point and ending up speechless

Brightspeed says the local outage will be resolved by 6:15pm today.

…

Why is it that every women's college game that ABC airs has a terrible sound mix? The ambient crowd noise drowns out the game callers every time. Everyone else gets it right, including ESPN (whose equipment and people ABC uses!), but ABC has been failing at this for months and months and months.

Today, I did a google search where the AI told me that I wasn't clear enough to get an AI answer and I should do better. The first 15 search results were all dead on. I did have to scroll to see the accurate results, so query-shamed and (mildly) inconvenienced.

If i were a local news provider, I'd spend a little time learning what locals actually call the roads you are providing helpful information about.

If I were VCU, I'd strongly consider hiring Coach Willy.

A cat lies next to an ancient stuffed animal and side-eyes the photographer

“I am a mighty hunter who definitely was not just nestled into this stuffed animal.”

I see I'm not the first person to see that a crepe place is coming to the old Jax/previous location of Fiesta Azteca.

Breakfast/Lunch, Savory/Sweet/Breakfast crepes, Late Spring.

This town still needs good Vietnamese, Indian, Afghan, or Kabobs (at some point, we will be getting Peruvian chicken!)

The Smith Energy sweatshirts the team is wearing are pretty sweet. I'd wear a long-sleeved t-shirt version of that in a heartbeat.

Sadly, they don't seem to be for sale anywhere.

Drove by the new 250/Afton Mtn "Truck Arrester" (aka truck ramp) shortly after the truck was "arrested" and then again 2 hours later (so many vehicles and people!) and we could tell something wasn't right, but "incorrect installation" was not on my list of possibilities. I have so many questions.

I will always dock a team -2 consideration points if - in this day and age - their university feels like they have to make clear the team is made up of women so you don't accidentally see awesome basketball with non-dudes

Everytime I see those He Gets Us commercials, I'm reminded that they are funded by people who use religion to justify hating people, who buy illegal antiquities (and remove them from their religious & historical context), and make people work through a pandemic while avoiding paying for insurance.

Went to Leyja's in Waynesboro for lunch. They've fixed up the old Purple Foot building nicely, & have a nice variety of BBQ, European, and standards. Recommended. We shared a cup of Bosnian stew (flavorful, rich miner's stew). I had an excellent Reuben and my companion got nachos with pulled pork.

Every time one of these coaches emotionally takes off his glasses, I gasp out "My god, you're beautiful!"

It's that time of year where I mutter mean things under my breath about the design choices the ACC makes for the women's tournament.

EVERY. YEAR.

When I heard a bus ran into a house, I assumed it was at Preston and Rugby, not the set back house at Barracks Rd and Georgetown. Dang!

When we went by there was no signs of braking in front of the giant hole in the side of the building.

um, is the Ole Miss mascot I just saw a red solo cup?

The last time Virginia played North Carolina in mbb, one preview article which was totally not AI and completely written by a human being who was employed to cover sports, kept referring the game between Virginia and North.

No actual insights were included in the article, either.

... and because I'm apparently operating on a time delay, happy belated birthday, Ms. Nina Simone. Her music has made all this ... stuff a little more managable.

For my money, her version of Pirate Jenny is the best.

I have had 3 bosses request weekly status reports a la that dumb federal email. They got overwhelmed with 5-20 responses, determined they were not actually helpful, and retracted the requests within 1-5 weeks. Even the brand new boss trying to figure out all of our responsibilities found it useless.

FedEx is the only delivery company that throws packages onto the lawn (snow covered, or while snowing) or a dead flower bed right in front of the deliveries this way sign. Every other delivery service drives the 20 additional feet to leave packages at either of the easily accessible doors.

It's true - the crotchedy gene flowers when you retire. I have deleted four petty mean-spirited comments in the past five minutes that would do no one any good, especially me. I'm just mad and sad about the everything, and it's easier to focus on things that don't have such a tragic price tag.

I took a photo last night that cleverly indicates that the T in LGBTQ+ does matter, & can't be made invisible by a idiot who thinks find & replace makes him a tech bro god, but it's better to be clear. This is one of the worst things this administration is doing, and that is a very high bar.

Brightspeed says there is an “area equipment outage” and we should get internet back by 12:08 am

I recently found some really small bubble wrap that I foresee turning green.