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Japan-born British writer Kazuo Ishiguro, author of The Remains of the Day, Never Let Me Go and A Pale View of Hills, is 2017's winner of the Nobel Prize for Literature.The novelist was praised by the Swedish Academy as a writer "who, in novels of great emotional force, has uncovered the abyss beneath our illusory sense of connection with the world".On living on cultural peripheries:Ishiguro left Japan in 1960 at the age of 5 and did not return to visit until 1989, nearly 30 years later, as a participant in the Japan Foundation Short-Term Visitors Program. In an interview with Kenzaburō Ōe, Ishiguro acknowledged that the Japanese settings of his first two novels were imaginary: "I grew up with a very strong image in my head of this other country, a very important other country to which I had a strong emotional tie ... In England I was all the time building up this picture in my head, an imaginary Japan."When discussing his Japanese heritage and its influence on his upbringing, the author has stated, "I'm not entirely like English people because I've been brought up by Japanese parents in a Japanese-speaking home. My parents didn't realize that we were going to stay in this country for so long, they felt responsible for keeping me in touch with Japanese values. I do have a distinct background. I think differently, my perspectives are slightly different." When asked to what extent he identifies as either Japanese or English the author insists, "People are not two-thirds one thing and the remainder something else. Temperament, personality, or outlook don't divide quite like that. The bits don't separate clearly. You end up a funny homogeneous mixture. This is something that will become more common in the latter part of the century—people with mixed cultural backgrounds, and mixed racial backgrounds. That's the way the world is going."His latest—his first novel in a decade—is the historical fantasy The Buried Giant, set in Arthurian times.

The remains of proto-Santa may have been found. An intact tomb has been found beneath the Church of Saint Nicholas in Demre, a popular site for pilgrimages due to the belief it is the final resting place of the Christmas phantom.Via BBC:An intact tomb has been found underneath Saint Nicholas Church, in the Demre district of Turkey's south-west province of Antalya.Demre was built on the ruins of Myra, where St Nicholas was thought to have lived in the 4th Century.Until now, the bones of St Nicholas were believed to be in Bari, Italy.It had been thought they were taken by Italian merchants in 1087 when Myra - at the time a Greek town - was invaded by the Seljuk Turks.By then St Nicholas was already revered among Christians for his generosity, in particular to children, and his humility.The church of St Nicholas in Demre is a popular destination for pilgrims as the site of St Nicholas's final resting place, and archaeological excavations have been taking place there for 20 years.

No need to lie to your kids about why Santa Claus didn’t come this year since Turkish archeologists believe they know where his dead body lies. Archeologists discovered a temple underneath Saint Nicholas Church in the Turkish province of Antalya and believe it may be the site where the 4th-century saint could have been buried, according to Hurriyet Daily News. “We have obtained very good results but real work starta now,” said Cemil Karabayram, Antalya Director of Surveying and Monuments. “We will reach the ground and maybe we will find the untouched body of St. Nicholas.” Karabayram told the Turkish newspaper CT scanning and geo-radar were used to survey the church, and excavations will begin after preserving the church’s mosaics. Via Hurriyet Daily News: Karabayram said there had been many comprehensive works related to the tomb of St. Nicholas. “We studied all of the documents from between 1942 and 1966. There were some notes there. According to these notes, this church was demolished and rebuilt. During the reconstruction, traders in Bari took the bones. But it is said that these bones did not belong to St. Nicholas but to another priest. One of those to have said this was Professor Yıldız Ötüken, an academic of Hacettepe University’s history of art department. She says that St Nicholas is kept in a special section,” he added. Image: Steve Jurvetson

The FDA is finally putting a stop to food companies trying to tempt customers who can’t distinguish baking ingredients from symbolic forms of affection. Officials from the US Food and Drug Administration sent a letter to the owners of Nashoba Brook Bakery warning them the company was violating label regulations by listing “love” as an ingredient in its granola, according to Bloomberg News. "Love" is not a common or usual name of an ingredient, and is considered to be intervening material because it is not part of the common or usual name of the ingredient,” the FDA wrote in the letter.John Gates, CEO of Nashoba Brook Bakery, said the FDA’s warning about the granola “ingredient” was “silly.”“I really like that we list ‘love’ in the granola,” Gates said in a telephone interview with Bloomberg News Tuesday. “People ask us what makes it so good. It’s kind of nice that this artisan bakery can say there’s love in it and it puts a smile on people’s face. Situations like that where the government is telling you you can’t list ‘love’ as an ingredient, because it might be deceptive, just feels so silly.” The letter also warned food products were “prepared, packed, or held under insanitary conditions whereby they may have become contaminated with filth, or whereby they may have been rendered injurious to health.” “Some of FDA’s observations, particularly on some of the sanitation issues, were helpful,” Gates said.Image: pxhere

Tanner, I think you need to be reminded from time to time that you are one of the few people on this team who is not a Jew, spic, nigger, pansy or a booger-eating moron. So you'd better cool it or we may be disposed to beat the crap out of you.I always wished they had let Alfred Ogilvie, the Bad News Bears statistician, beat the heck out of Tanner Boyle right there.Is it baseball season?

This is Mochi, a St. Bernard from Sioux Falls, South Dakota, who set a Guinness Word Record for her impressive tongue. Mochi is a rescue dog now happily living with Carla and Craig Rickert. From Laughing Squid:According to Carla, Mochi came to them as an abused and neglected two year old, but quickly became an integral part of the family. Carla also revealed that Mochi absolutely adores peanut butter.Mo is resilient, comical, loving and eternally grateful and loyal to us – her forever family. This once abused and neglected pup has taught us that it’s okay to be different. We are proud of her unique feature… Officially measured by a vet at 18.58 cm (7.3 in) – the equivalent of two-and-a-half Jenga blocks in a row – Mochi’s was verified as the Longest tongue on a dog (current).

Two NYPD plainclothes detectives and their supervisor have been placed on "modified duty" pending an Internal Affairs Bureau investigation into claims that they handcuffed and raped a teenager in a police department van. In their defense, Brooklyn South Narcotics Detectives Edward Martins and Richard Hall are claiming the girl happily consented to having sex with them after she'd been handcuffed, kidnapped, thrown in a van, and taken to a deserted spot.From The New York Times:The detectives searched the occupants of the car for drugs, [the woman’s lawyer, Michael David] said, and demanded that the woman lift her shirt. “They said, ‘We want to make sure there is nothing under there, so show it,’” Mr. David said, recounting his client’s account. “She was petrified, so she showed it. She said, ‘See, I’m not hiding anything.’”Immediately after, the woman was ordered out of the car, placed in handcuffs and put into the back seat of the detectives’ black Dodge van, Mr. David said. She was told she would be driven to the 60th Precinct, about a mile and a half from the park.Instead, the lawyer said, the detectives drove to a parking lot of a nearby Chipotle restaurant, where she said they raped her.The woman remained handcuffed during the entire ordeal, her lawyer said.About 45 minutes after she was handcuffed, the woman said she was shoved out of the van not far from the 60th Precinct, Mr. David said. The woman contacted her mother, who took her to Maimonides Medical Center in Borough Park, Brooklyn.From The New York Daily News:The detectives handcuffed the teen after finding marijuana and the anxiety drug Klonopin in a bag next to her and drove her away, according to the friend, who said he was suspicious about the cops from the start.“I had Prozac on me,” said the friend, who declined to be named. “They said that it’s supposed to be in the bottle but they just gave it back to me.”They only handcuffed the woman, telling her friends that they were taking her to the 60th Precinct on W. Eighth St. in Coney Island for processing.Instead, Martins and Hall allegedly took her to a secluded spot about two blocks from the 60th Precinct stationhouse, where she says she was forced to perform a sex act on both cops.Image: Youngking11/Wikipedia

Former Equifax CEO Richard Smith -- who retired with $90m for his year's work after overseeing a breach of 145,500,000 Americans' most sensitive date -- testified before Congress yesterday and explained the cause of the breach: "The human error was that the individual who's responsible for communicating in the organization to apply the patch, did not." (more…)

Rule #1 of hacking is "attribution is hard" (other contenders: "don't be on fire," "don't get involved in a land-war in Asia" or "there is no security in obscurity"), which is to say, it's really hard to say who hacked you, in part because it's really easy for hackers to make it look like someone else did the deed. (more…)

Trump might be a moron, as far as Secretary of State Rex Tillerson is concerned, but the pay's good enough for him. In a hastily-arranged press conference following NBC News' morning report about Tillerson-Trump friction, he denied one key claim--that he had to be talked out of quitting--but did not deny calling his boss a "moron" in front of others.Tillerson, after denying the report, vaulted into a round of obsequious praise aimed at an audience of one.He loves this country. He puts Americans and America first. He's smart. He demands results wherever he goes and he holds those around him accountable for whether they've done the job he asked them to do. Accountability is one of the bedrock values the president and I share.Pretty humiliating, but you don't get where Rex got by having self-respect. https://twitter.com/business/status/915594445772308480

Last March, a Nevada court indicted April Parks, proprietor of A Private Professional Guardian, which had secured court guardianship over four hundred elderly Nevadans, working with crooked doctors and social workers to find the identities of old people who had considerable assets, then using a streamlined court process with no checks and balances to have those people declared to be unable to care for themselves. (more…)

Participatory journalism pioneer Dan Gillmor (previously) has just launched Co/Lab, a new project at Arizona State University's Cronkite School of Journalism for "creating, testing, and promoting innovations that will help make the news ecosystem more robust and valuable for all participants." (more…)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yB9pN0H7saATheresa May's speech to the Conservative Party conference last night was a "nightmare," from the moment when comedian Lee Nelson (last seen showering corrupt FIFA boss with handfuls of money) crept up to the stage and handed the Prime Minister a P45 form (the form that bosses in the UK use to formally fire their employees), telling her "Boris told me to do it." (more…)

Colorspike is a programmable LED wand a yard or so long, designed to create lighting moods for filmmakers. A crackling fire just out of shot, for example, or the suggestion of a computer scanning a body for life signs — all easily accomplished with a small battery-powered gadget. It seems incredibly versatile and a must for anyone who wants to shoot narrative on a budget, but we won't know if it lives up to the demos until it Kickstarts. At $300, it seems reasonably-priced, too — compare to Ice Light [Amazon], a similar light that only does unprogrammed 5500&deg and has found its way into just about everyone's bag in the last few years.

In 1848, five years before Japan opened its closed society to the West, a lone American in a whaleboat landed on the country's northern shore, drawn only by a sense of mystery and a love of adventure. In this week's episode of the Futility Closet podcast we'll follow Ranald MacDonald as he travels the length of Japan toward a destiny that will transform the country.We'll also remember a Soviet hero and puzzle over some security-conscious neighbors.Show notesPlease support us on Patreon!

Scuba Diving magazine announced the winners of its underwater photography contest and the results are an awe-inspiring glimpse of another world that exists within our own. Above, Kevin Richter's magnificent photo of an octopus in Lembeh Strait, Indonesia, took first place in the compact camera category. Below: Rodney Bursiel took first prize in the wide angle category for this shot of a whale calf breaching in Tavarua, Fiji; Eduardo Acevedo's image of this ribbon eel in Lembeh Strait, Indonesia won second place for macro photography.See the rest at Scuba Diving Magazine.

Turns out that the total number of people whose lives Equifax ruined by doxing them and then dumping all their most sensitive personal and financial data is 145,500,000, not 143,000,000. The company's new CEO apologized for the misunderstanding, and persisted in calling the people his company destroyed "customers" despite the fact that the vast majority of them were not Equifax customers, just random people whom Equifax compiled massive dossiers on, and then lost control over.

The object of this retro arcade game, called Thoughts and Prayers is to send and many thoughts and prayers as you can in order to stop mass shootings before the timer runs out. Play it it and post your score in the comments.

The Intercept's Sharon Lerner is the best journalist on Trumpian science appointees going, and her piece on Michael Dourson, whom Trump wants confirmed as the EPA's second most powerful executive as Director of the Office of Chemical Safety and Pollution Prevention is a scorcher. (more…)

The Simulation Hypothesis holds that alien races (or future versions of humanity) will eventually get the computing power and programming techniques to simulate the whole universe and that when they do, they will probably do so millions of times, meaning that most universes are simulations, and thus the odds that this universe is not a simulation are vanishingly small. (more…)

Carmen Yulin Cruz is the outspoken mayor of San Juan, the capital of Puerto Rico, who was publicly denounced by Donald Trump for pointing out the federal government's inaction during the worst humanitarian disaster in modern US history. Trump went on to characterize Puerto Ricans -- chest deep in sewage raw sewage with no fresh water, no homes, no power and no gasoline -- as "wanting everything done for them." (more…)

Yesterday, the Supreme Court heard the re-argument of Sessions v. Dimaya, a case that asks whether the administration can treat lawful immigrants to the USA (including Green Card holders like me) as though we have no Constitutional rights. (more…)

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A dumb teenage laxative-devouring competition ended in tears; also in low blood potassium, massive dehydration, crippling headaches, and the transformation of the victim's body into a toxic waste dump: "If your kidney doesn't function, your body, down to its bones, will rot away and eventually you'll die in a pool of your own waste that should have been your urine".Here's an illustration of what was left of his kidneys.

FOLLOW @RubenBolling on the Twitters and a Face Book.JOIN Tom the Dancing Bug's subscription club, the Proud & Mighty INNER HIVE, for exclusive early access to comics, extra comics, and much more. GET Ruben Bolling’s new hit book series for kids, The EMU Club Adventures. (”Filled with wild twists and funny dialogue” -Publishers Weekly) Book One here. Book Two here. More Tom the Dancing Bug comics on Boing Boing! (more…)

"I dress for myself because I never know where I'm going to land, or where I'm going to sing, or what I'm going to do," says Frances, who is 103 years old. Pond's Cold Cream, short bangs, Sephora, manicures, lipstick only... watch these amazing women 100-years and older share their beauty secrets with us.

I can't wait to see Jane, the new National Geographic documentary about the inspiring primatologist Jane Goodall who famously lived with chimpanzees in Tanzania for decades and has worked tireless on conservation and animal welfare issues her entire adult life. The film, containing unseen footage of Jane in the jungle, was directed by Brett Morgen (Kurt Cobain: Montage of Heck) with music by minimalist master Philip Glass!This photo below of Jane Goodall observing chimpanzees in Gombe Stream National Park, Tanzania, taken by her mother Vanne Morris-Goodall, was encoded on the Voyager Golden Record launched into space 40 years ago:

As the Spanish government was hacking the Catalonian independence movement, shutting down the .cat top-level domain, and engaging mass-blocking of websites and apps to control information about yesterday's referendum on Catalonian independence, the Xnet collective published a basic (but wide-ranging) guide to "preserving fundamental rights on the Internet," suitable for anyone living under the kind of state suppression that Spain underwent. (more…)

Firefighters had to rescue this fellow who got stuck on a telephone wire 19 floors above the ground. He found himself in this predicament because he didn't want to pay his hotel bill and decided to climb out the window and traverse along a phone wire to another building, thus avoiding the pesky clerk at the counter on the ground floor. About halfway across, he gave up and waited for someone to save him.

NPR's All Things Considered aired a wonderful piece about the Voyager Golden Record's first-ever vinyl release that I co-produced with my friends Tim Daly and Lawrence Azerrad. Listen to Alexi Horowitz-Ghazi's report here:Last week, (the original Voyager Golden Record's producer Timothy) Ferris got his box set in the mail. He says that his friend, the late Carl Sagan, would be delighted by what they made."I think this record exceeds Carl's — not only his expectations, but probably his highest hopes for a release of the Voyager record," Ferris says. "I'm glad these folks were finally able to make it happen."Pescovitz says he's just glad to have returned the Golden Record to the world that created it.At a moment of political division and media oversaturation, Pescovitz and Daly say they hope that their Golden Record can offer a chance for people to slow down for a moment; to gather around the turntable and bask in the crackly sounds of what Sagan called the "pale blue dot" that we call home."As much as it was a gift from humanity to the cosmos, it was really a gift to humanity as well," Pescovitz says. "It's a reminder of what we can accomplish when we're at our best.""The Voyager Golden Record Finally Finds An Earthly Audience" (NPR)The Voyager Golden Record is now available for pre-order on vinyl or CD from Ozma Records.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FnES-PPWVbYTim O'Reilly (previously) is my kind of technologist: someone who goes past the "is technology good or bad for us?" question and dives into the really meaty, important question, namely: "how can we make technology better for us?" (more…)

The official party line from Taser -- who make less-lethal electrical weapons as well as a range of police body-cameras and other forensic devices -- is that its weapons don't kill ("no one has died directly from the device’s shock"). Reuters reporters who heard this claim decided it was highly suspect and took action, mining America's court records to find "150 autopsy reports citing Tasers as a cause or contributor to deaths," and that those deaths were disproportionately inflicted on "society’s vulnerable – unarmed, in psychological distress and seeking help" -- all told, they found 1005 deaths in which Tasers were implicated. (more…)

If you absolutely can’t wait for the return of Netflix’s nostalgic sci-fi masterwork at the end of the month, this premium Stranger Things poster might help tide you over.This 11” x 17” wall decoration features a chilling render of Millie Bobby Brown’s iconic shaved head, complete with a silhouette of the monstrous Demogorgon. Whether you appreciate the Duffer Brothers’ creation for its love of tabletop role-playing games, the accurate depiction of early 1980's Indiana, or you just dig the spooky, Carpenter-esque synth theme, you can celebrate Stranger Things with crisp image quality from this 100lb. archival photo paper.Grab a Stranger Things poster from the Boing Boing Store for $13.95.More Deals from the Boing Boing Store:Social Media Rockstar Bundle: $29 (97% off)Clip & Snap Smartphone Camera Lenses: $17.99 (74% off)4-Piece Knife and Peeler Set: $26.99 (73% off)

Remember 2004, pre-Twitter times, when Donald Trump was forced to secretly write his insults on paper and then mail them to his enemies? Virgin Group founder Richard Branson sure does, and he’s sharing a 13-year-old letter Trump sent scolding him for starting a reality show similar to The Apprentice. Branson published the surly letter in his upcoming book, Finding My Virginity, according to The Independent. The tirade includes Trump ravings such as: “You should try to get out of the airline business too...;” “I wonder out loud how you can be anywhere close to a billionaire…;” and “Do not use me to promote your rapidly sinking show…” Excerpts of Trump’s letter via The Independent: “At least your dismal ratings can now allow you to concentrate on your airline which, I am sure, needs every ounce of your energy,” Mr Trump wrote.“It is obviously a terrible business and I can’t imagine, with fuel prices etc, that you can be doing any better in it than anyone else.“Like television, you should try to get out of the airline business too, as soon as possible! Actually, I wonder out loud how you can be anywhere close to a billionaire and be in that business. Perhaps the title of your show, The Rebel Billionaire, is misleading?“In any event, do not use me to promote your rapidly sinking show – you are a big boy, try doing it yourself!”Image: Jarle Naustvik

When there's a mass shooting in America, a pattern repeats itself. Some people remind themselves that nothing will ever change...https://twitter.com/dpjhodges/status/611943312401002496?lang=en... and others assume that this time it will, and go out and buy guns before it's too late. Shares of Sturm Ruger (RGR) were up 6%, while American Outdoor Brands (AOBC), the company formerly known as Smith & Wesson, gained nearly 7%. Both stocks have tended to rally in the immediate aftermath of mass killings, which sadly have become more routine.The Pulse nightclub in Orlando in June 2016. San Bernardino in December 2015. The Aurora, Colorado movie theater and Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, Conn. in 2012.Investors had bet that these massacres would lead to tougher gun control laws, especially because of tough talk from President Obama.The stricter laws never materialized. Instead, gun sales climbed during the Obama administration's two terms as gun aficionados bought more firearms just in case rules changed at a national level or in individual states controlled by Democrats.The presumption is that liberals tend to be fatalistic, while conservatives expect gun control. The business's been depressed since Trump won the election, so both beliefs now benefit the gun lobby in the wake of an attack.

Ruth from Openmedia writes, "This Thursday legislators in the EU Parliament are voting on proposals in the EU for mass content filters, and restrictions on links, all in the name of 'updating copyright. (more…)

If you're one of those people who constantly dips into a text editor to work with snippets of text -- notes, lists, quotes, URLs, and so on -- you'll love Tyke. A free app by Andre Torrez, it lives in the MacOS menu bar and replaces those barely-used editor windows cluttering desktop and dock. The Susan Kare-esque icon is maybe my favorite thing about it, suggesting a missing feature of Macs going back decades.

Though it looks like a normal sponge, the Gonzo Pet Hair Lifter – a brick of latex mattress material – has a peculiar tacky texture. It's easy to mistake for other "clever" sponge products, such as those covered in suede, cellulose or microfiber or whatever, but it's much better for dealing with fuzz. It's the most effective thing for dealing with dog hair I've ever tried, in fact, and I'll never go back to adhesive lint rollers or static brushes after risking $6 on it. (more…)

https://youtu.be/7e4vFMJmBIcLast night's Saturday Night Live once again took aim at Donald Trump, with Alec Baldwin reprising his eerily good Trump impression, while Kate McKinnon stole the show with her racist elf Jeff Sessions (Alex Moffat is also a body-double for Chuck Schumer, but regrettably wasn't very funny).

Equifax sources say that the massive breach of 140,000,000 Americans' personal information was the result of state-sponsored hackers, likely from China, but attribution is hard and inexact. (more…)

TangerineBlast's Alexander Hamilton: An Equestrian Musical is far from perfect, but there are inspired moments in the execution that speak of an encylopedic grasp of the entire corpus of My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic canon. (Thanks, Alice!)

Nomblr created a fully-functional USB keyboard out of a 1950s Morse Key he inherited from his dad.I can just about remember growing up around beautifully designed analogue devices like rotary dial phones, typewriters, and record players. I’ve always like the idea of converting these largely defunct objects into digital devices, and my Dad’s old Morse key seemed like a simple project to get started on. It was a surprisingly involved process, requiring not just learning to program a Teensy but also some good old-fashioned woodwork.

Transgender teen Ally Lee Steinfeld was stabbed in the genitals, had her eyes gouged out, and was burned to a charred crisp. But she was not the victim of a hate crime, say the police and prosecutor.Steinfeld, 17, was allegedly attacked by her girlfriend and two teenagers in an assault in Cabool, Texas Country, Missouri which left her with her eyes gouged out, court records said.Steinfeld, who was born as Joseph Matthew Steinfeld, had been missing for a month before investigators found her charred remains in a bag dumped in a chicken coop.It came weeks after a post on social media site Instagram where she described herself as "mtf", or male-to-female, later adding: “I am proud to be me I am proud to be trans.”But the authorities insisted Steinfeld’s murder was not motivated by her sexuality or gender.Prosecutor Parke Stevens Jr told news agency AP: "I would say murder in the first-degree is all that matters. That is a hate crime in itself."If all murders are hate crimes, none of them are. If you can thank the Internet for one thing this summer, it's the fact it might force at least a perfunctory prosecution out of this gentleman.

Python is one of the first languages taught in university Computer Science degrees for a reason. It’s got a plethora of modern language features that help you write clean, human-readable code that doesn’t dwell on low-level stuff like memory management. But Python skills will take you far beyond introductory CS courses — this language is used extensively in the realm of machine learning, big data, and web development. To get a thorough understanding of everything that this versatile tech is capable of, take a look at the Python Power Coder BONUS Bundle.If you’ve never coded before, this bundle will introduce you to the fundamentals of programming. But once you’ve wrapped your head around the basics, you’ll start making real web applications, build network services, explore artificial intelligence, and learn to analyze massive volumes of data. Here’s everything that’s included in this collection:The Developers' Guide to Python 3 ProgrammingStep by Step: Build a Data Analysis ProgramThe Python Mega Course: Build 10 Real World ApplicationsThe Complete Computer Vision Course with PythonLearn Python 3 from ScratchPython Tutorial: Python Network Programming - Build 7 AppsPython Web ProgrammingTaming Big Data with Apache Spark and PythonThis bundle is available now for $44 from the Boing Boing Store.More Deals from the Boing Boing store:1080p HD Waterproof WiFi Wireless Endoscopic Camera $39.99Pay What You Want: Learn to Code 2017 BundleThe MacX Media Conversion Lifetime License Bundle $19.99

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ok2q1iOVihAThinkgeek's $30 Critical Hit Waffle Maker produces D20 carbohydrates on demand, which makes it the best breakfast roll going. (more…)

California's heavy rains led to a bounty for wildlife in the woods where I live. The local rat population has soared, due to a lack of predators, and apparently they have declared my woodshed home. I would have thought rats would steer a clear path around a home with several cats and dogs. My Great Pyrenees spreads gallons of dog urine over the yard to warn invading animals to steer clear. My Maine Coon cat, Heart, constantly patrols the inside of the home, and I sometimes leave bags of his spent litter outside the back door to allow their scent to permeate the area. None of this has deterred the Norwegian Tree Rat from establishing a base of operations in my woodshed.Simply clearing the Spring and Summer's over-grown vegetation back from around my house was a cultural misstep and I have unintentionally offended the rodent kingdom. Not happy to stay in their thinned back ivy and cypress hedges, rats have set up a refugee colony in my woodshed, or greatly expanded a long minor outpost. I'm not excited to move a cord of wood just to displace this rodent insurrection. Luckily I do not see any signs of them inside my home, where canine and feline alike patrol constantly. Their presence, however, is easily detectable around the foundation of my home. Yuck! I can also hear them in the shed and bushes when I step outside to smoke weed at night. Do not fuck with my rituals, rats. Do not.I decided it was time to take action before things got more serious. I had a few traps around from the last time I saw rat-sign, several years ago. I would set them.I use old fashioned wood and metal spring rat-sized snap traps. You can get them for less than $2 each via Amazon in packs of 12. You may not need 12. I think I may be needing several dozen. When I first moved into my home, 10 years ago, the prior owners had left a lot of those city-park style "pet and kid safe" black boxes full of warfarin based rat poison all over the property. I thought the potential for local rat predators to suffer out-of-bounds for I who chooses to live near lots of wildlife. It was years before I saw evidence of any rodentia, so when they did appear I used the tried and true method of snap traps.I'm typing this with a gouge in one of my thumbs from setting the traps, so I do need to exercise more care. I caught myself on a sharp bit, rather than breaking fingers in the trap but BE CAREFUL! This trap will cause immense pain to humans and pets. You can bend the bait/release platform a bit to increase or decrease trap sensitivity. I tend to find the traps come too sensitive out of the package, but are easy to get set right. Spend some time before baiting the trap making sure you can set it and then place it where you want it without it going off. This will be much cleaner in the long run.In the world of baits there appears to be only one that works reliably, and it works so well I do not know why anyone hunting Norwegian Tree Rats would bother with anything but smooth Skippy peanut butter. School children, dogs and those awful vermin all love the stuff. I use the peanut butter for getting the dogs to take pills, and getting rats to die. A teaspoon scoop covers the bait-plate and is sticky enough the rats set off the trap and meet their doom.Another reason I prefer the all wood/metal traps is that I can just throw them away with the dead rodent. There have been local reports of rabid bats that give me pause. I don't need to muck around with bloody, ant covered rat carcasses to save a $2 trap that may now smell like death and not work anyways. I have read that the yellow plastic bait-plate traps are "better" because they have pre-set sensitivity spots and the surface of the plate is larger for easier set-it-off-leverage. I just think the plastic gets in the way of recycling the nasty trap, and costs a bit more.I also stuffed steel wool into every hole I saw in the exterior of my home that may admit vermin, I hear the vermin do not like that.I have been setting two traps a night for the last 2 nights. 4 rats are dead. I am going to set two traps a night for the next week. I realize I can never and will never eradicate them, but I'd like to push the population back to where they stay out of sight, again.I will let you know how the battle progresses.

Republican Governor Susana Martinez of New Mexico allegedly dashed on her bill at a burger restaurant Wednesday in what her office is calling a “super-sized nothing burger.” The manager of Five Star Burgers in Santa Fe said that when separate bills came for the to-go order, Martinez “crumpled” hers and threw it in the trash, according to the Santa Fe New Mexican. A few hours later after reports broke about the incident, the man Martinez ordered with came back and paid for her $17 Bison Burger meal, a server said. Martinez’s office said the incident was simply a misunderstanding. “The governor pays for her meals, including this one, and attempting to exploit an obviously honest misunderstanding just demonstrates how petty our politics have become,” a spokesman for the governor said. Image: New Mexico State Government

Erin Haworth of The Smithsonian says:Thought you might be interested in Clive Thompson’s latest tech column in the October issue of Smithsonian magazine, which takes a look at virtual reality and how its shocking power was all the buzz once before — about 150 years ago! Thompson admits he once thought modern day virtual reality might be a fad. He changed his mind about it as he researched the similarities between VR and the stereoscope, a curious illusion discovered in 1838 that used vision and perspective to make the brain assemble two slightly varied images into a three-dimensional view. Thompson now predicts VR is here to stay.The stereoscope became wildly popular in its day, crossing all cultural and class boundaries, transforming science, inspiring artists and being used as an educational tool. As VR edges into the mainstream, Thompson also takes a look at the various applications of today’s technology as it gets better and cheaper.