Christopher Brown is a lawyer and science fiction writer; his debut, 2017's Tropic of Kansas, was an outstanding novel of authoritarianism and resistance, and his next book, Rule of Capture (out on Monday, watch for my review!) is a legal thriller about disaster capitalism, climate catastrophe, and hard-fought political change.In a tremendous and thoughtful essay for Tor.com, Brown explores the role that law plays in science fiction and fantasy, where, despite a wealth of writers who are formally trained in the law, the majority of "legal" drama is courtroom drama that is "about lawyers and almost never about the law" -- instead, they're about "facts -- about the bad things people do to each other, and about the process of finding out who’s guilty or innocent."But some of the most interesting legal sf is about the laws themselves: how they're passed, what changes they wreak on the world, how they get repealed. At its best, sf can subject laws to the same thought experiments it uses when considering gadgets, using narrative to figure out what changes, what stays the same, and who benefits and who loses.Part of the problem is cultural. A genre that creates safe spaces to express difference from prevailing norms is wary of suits telling them what the rules are, as opposed to what they could be. The bigger problem is one of plausibility—lawyers don’t feel like the future. The legal system we have is an immense labyrinth of code and procedure that reflects all the myriad complexity of modern life, but it’s also one of the most extant vestiges of our primitive roots—a system created by our ancient forebears to regulate disputes through a means other than violence. Read the rest

President Donald Trump earlier this week issued a phony and cringe-y “call for unity” after the two mass shootings in Dayton, Ohio, and El Paso, Texas. Today on noted hate platform Twitter, the President of the United States personally attacked the mayor of Dayton, one of the senators from Ohio, and the former congressman who represented El Paso.Oh, also, Shep Smith.The president makes time for media criticism in between visits to cities that suffered mass shootings. https://t.co/FYWQYYU0Ld— Chris Megerian (@ChrisMegerian) August 7, 2019The president, who earlier this week called for unity in the wake of the two mass shootings, has now attacked the mayor of Dayton, one of the senators from Ohio, the former congressman who represented El Paso. And Shep Smith.— Kyle Griffin (@kylegriffin1) August 7, 2019President Trump, Monday in the Diplomatic Room: "Now is the time to set destructive partisanship aside — so destructive — and find the courage to answer hatred with unity, devotion, and love." https://t.co/ce0EqmaDuT— Meridith McGraw (@meridithmcgraw) August 7, 2019 Read the rest

In Whisky tasting using a bimetallic nanoplasmonic tongue (Nanoscale/Royal Society of Chemistry), a team from U Glasgow's School of Engineering describe their work on an "artificial tongue" lined with "tastebuds" that sense "plasmonic resonance" (the absorption of light by liquids) to produced highly detailed accounts of the profiles of Scotch whiskys, which can be used to determine whether a given whisky is counterfeit.The team claims more than 99% sensing and identification accuracy. We have presented a reusable bimetallic nanoplasmonic tongue that displays two distinct resonance peaks per region and whose orthogonal surface chemistries can be selectively modified to tune their ‘tasting’ sensitivity. These unique features have allowed us to halve both the sensor size and necessary data-acquisition time while still providing dataset clustering upon PCA and successful classification with LDA. This is a versatile system, allowing the development of high quality nanoplasmonic tongues for any given application via simple alterations to the chosen surface ligands and/or plasmonic metals in order to produce new sensors with unique chemical responses. This new approach to artificial tongue design may spur the development of portable devices for applications in a point of care diagnostics, counterfeit detection in high-value drinks, environmental monitoring, and defense. Whisky tasting using a bimetallic nanoplasmonic tongue [Gerard Macias, Justin R. Sperling, William J. Peveler, Glenn A. Burley, Steven L. Neale and Alasdair W. Clark/Nanoscale](via Beyond the Beyond) Read the rest

John Lambert is a 23-year-old from Tennessee who has done a lot in his short years on this earth: in addition to co-founding "Students for Trump," he also co-founded a fake law firm called Pope & Dunn, where he pretended to be a lawyer called Eric Pope (law degree: NYU; finance degree: U Penn; years of legal experience: 15), and defrauded clients of $46,000.Lambert was charged in April and now he has pleaded guilty, admitting to wire fraud with an unnamed co-conspirator. Under his plea deal, he faces up to 21 months in prison.“John Lambert represented himself to clients as a prominent New York attorney with a law degree from an elite law school. But Lambert’s de facto career was one of a grifter: he had never been to law school and certainly wasn’t an attorney. Today, Lambert admitted to his crimes and faces time in prison for his misdeeds," Manhattan U.S. Attorney Geoffrey Berman said.Lambert achieved notoriety during the presidential campaign for the group he founded with classmate classmate Ryan Fournier at Campbell University in Buies Creek, N.C., in 2015. They made frequent media appearances and ran a Students For Trump Twitter account featuring photos of bikini-clad women and pics of themselves at political events.Students for Trump founder pleads guilty to posing as lawyer in $46K scam [Stephen Rex Brown/New York Daily News](Image: Screenshot of rally video) Read the rest

The Southern Poverty Law Center's Hatewatch makes a compelling case linking US Bureau of Energy Resources foreign affairs officer Matthew Q. Gebert with a series of violent white nationalist identities that have advocated acts of terror within in the USA and have been involved with recruiting for and promoting white nationalist terror organizations.Hatewatch draws on online history, eyewitness accounts, and a wealth of circumstantial evidence to link Gebert with "Coach Finstock," a prominent white nationalist terror-proponent. Hatewatch also claims that Gebert's wife, Anna Vuckovic, is behind the white nationalist pseudonym "Wolfie James."In addition to building the case linking Gebert and Vuckovic with white nationalist campaigns, Hatewatch assembles a dossier of statements that the Coach Finstock and Wolfie James pseudonyms have made and activities they have participated in, including Holocaust denial, glorifying Nazi soldiers, advocating for ethnic cleansing of non-whites from the USA, advocating for convincing US cops and soldiers to join a traitorous white nationalist movement, spreading antisemitic and anti-Black conspiracy theories, and glorifying mass-murderer Dylan Roof. The Coach Finstock identity is the organizer and leader of a DC-area neo-Nazi group called the "DC Helicopter Pilots," which is affiliated with Michael Peinovich's The Right Stuff network, a white nationalist movement.Gebert did not reply to Hatewatch's request for comment on the allegations. When Hatewatch visited Gebert and Vuckovic's home, Vuckovic denied the allegations.Gebert has worked for the US State Department since 2013 and is an alumn of George Washington University's prestigious "presidential management fellowship" program.The two sources who attended the dinner with Irving recalled that approximately 12 guests, including Gebert and Vuckovic, sat along a rectangular table with Irving in a private room at a hotel in the Washington, D.C. Read the rest

People fleeing and hiding from #timessquare after suspected live shooter #NewYork we caught this from our hotel bar 10th floor #police confirmed this was not a live shooter #timessquare #NYC pic.twitter.com/IKfagFbtzy— The Daniels Group (@DanielsGrp) August 7, 2019 At around 10pm last night in New York City's Times Square, the sound of backfiring motorcycles triggered panic and chaos. Listen below. I'd have run like hell too.Doesn’t sound like a motorcycle backfiring to me. Pure chaos 13 minutes ago. pic.twitter.com/17t425s6c8— Emma (@emma_elizabeth6) August 7, 2019 Please be advised that all is safe and secure in #timessquare 🌃. All reports of suspicious sounds were due to a large group of 🏍 cruising through the area on this nice evening. #connecting #protecting— NYPD Midtown South (@NYPDMTS) August 7, 2019 Read the rest

In Exile (Keeper of Lost Cities,) Sophie Foster is back and still being put through the most horrible adventures Shannon Messenger can imagine for a young teen!I am in love with the Keeper of Lost Cities series. Sophie Foster is a 13-year-old ripped from the loving arms of her human family and manipulated into saving the world. Kept in the dark about her own mysterious past (that everyone else seems to know,) Sophie is forced to sneak around and break every promise she makes about not doing exactly that! Sophie nearly dies every few chapters, while also putting 'friends' and 'family' at risk, however, it is unclear who is really a friend and who isn't!Sophie is an elf. For some reason, still, unbeknownst to the readers, Sophie was placed with a human family as a child and hidden away. When the elves find her they abduct her, brainwash her family into believing she never existed (after Sophie negotiates this fate for them rather than simply DEATH,) and then demand she save the world multiple times. I can not imagine a kid surviving this shit with a shred of self left at the end of the first book -- somehow things got EVEN WORSE for Sophie in book 2.After not really coming to grips with her fate from book 1, Sophie is forced into an adventure to save the only adult who seems to have told her anything much useful. Along the way, Sophie repairs her own damaged mind, which was responsible for losing her buddy in the first place. Read the rest

US Senator from Vermont Bernie Sanders went on some podcast to say that if, once he becomes President of these United States, he learns about aliens his wife will force him to tell us all he knows.Vice:Rogan: “If you got into the office and you found out something about aliens, if you found out something about UFOs, would you let us know?”Sanders: “Well I tell you, my wife would demand I let you know.”Rogan: “Is your wife a UFO nut?”Sanders: “No, she’s not a UFO nut. She goes, Bernie, ‘What is going on do you know? Do you have any access?’"Rogan: “You don’t have any access? You’ll let us know though?”Sanders: “Alright, we’ll announce it on the show. How’s that?” Read the rest

Here are some highlights from recent World Chase Tag competitions.“With World Chase Tag as a sport it really puts you in the moment and it almost makes you feel like a rabbit trapped in the head lights of a car,” competitor Richard Thompson, 19, told The Independent. “Will you run? Or will you freeze? This is something I’ve never felt in any other sport I’ve played and it makes things really interesting. But most of all it doesn’t feel like sport, it feels like play. That’s what I love about it.”You're it. Read the rest

Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell earned the moniker "Moscow Mitch" for refusing to protect elections from Russian interference. You can't blame him - Russians want to help the GOP take over the USA, so why would he stand in their way? In his annual Fancy Farm Picnic speech in Kentucky, Mitch McConnell did his best to remind folks that he's nothing like those strange lifeforms in "California and New York," and is "guy who sticks up for middle America," but most of his soporific platitudes were drowned out by middle Americans who think he's a traitor.Image: YouTube Read the rest

MxPx plays Aha's classicThe Downbeat 5 singing 'Dum Dum Ditty' is one of my favorites.Me First and the Gimmie Gimmie's cover 'Wild World'Riverboat Gamblers play 'Let's Go Crazy'The Laundrettes sing 'Nobody but Me'NoFX's 'Go Your Own Way'MORE! Add more in the comments...Photo by Robert Anasch on Unsplash Read the rest

Dominic of The Viral Video Lab demonstrates a paper airplane that will circle "endlessly" when caught in the airstream of seven personal fans. Of course, proper positioning of the plane is key. "It took me about 35 takes to create this video," Dominic writes.Below is a video on folding your own "Infinity Paper Plane."(via Laughing Squid) Read the rest

The Tony Martini Variety Hour is running this Saturday, August 8th at the Three Clubs.A desperate variety show clinging to the art, music, and style that worked so well in the late 50s and early 60s takes the stage this Saturday night in the city of fallen angels! Amazing performers put everything they can into an art form we thought went away with the Star Wars Holiday Special! Come and marvel at the madness!Tony Martini, your host, and titular lounge singer-y guy is portrayed by global comedy legend Mark Fite. Mark sings, jokes, and frequently falls flat on his face. Luckily, Martini is accompanied by his super talented wife, Bananas Foster. Foster could only be played by international accordion phenomenon Renee Albert. Jim Turner plays their less than kind and understanding manager.Produced by Steven Espinosa, the cast is joined by a veritable mob of Los Angeles finest variety acts: Michael Rayner, Pam Severns, Karl Herlinger, April Showers, Olive Oz and the always incredible contortionist Bonnie Morgan.I'm gonna be there! Join us Saturday, August 8th at the Three Clubs. Doors open at 7pm. Show starts at 8pm.Photos by Safi Alia Shabaik. Read the rest

Context is everything, especially when it's missing.(via r/ObscureMedia) Read the rest

The Lock Picking Lawyer is one of my favorite YouTubers, and he's spreading his wings beyond the usual fare of dreadful padlocks and crap safes. Here he shows how to use a $2 generic remote control to "blind" SimpliSafe, a security gadget that's getting rave reviews from product testers. This however is a little 433 megahertz remote you can get them on Amazon or Ebay for about $2, and even though it'snot very powerful, it's powerful enough. Let's demonstrate using this entry sensor. I'm going to arm the system, and you can see if I were to open whateverthis was attached to—let's say the frontdoor—the keypad starts starts beeping telling me to enter the pin or the alarm will be triggered. Okay let's try that one more time. But before I open the front door, I'm going to press and hold the button on this remote.As you can see, I opened and closed the front door and SimpliSafe had no ideaHere's a $2 one, shipping included, on eBay. Amazon matches the price. If we can't review the security of security devices, we shouldn't be reviewing them at all, should we? Read the rest

As the Hong Kong uprising hits its sixth week, the island is running out of protective gear to guard the surging protesters against police violence; in response, Hong Kongers in Taiwan and Taiwanese sympathizers have been bulk-shipping helmets, gas masks and other materiel (as well as cash) to the protesters (in Kaohsiung, Taiwan, queues formed as people waited to make donations).In response, Chinese and Hong Kong authorities have stepped up inspections of packages from Taiwan to Hong Kong, and have seized anything that might be used by protesters. For now, Hong Kong-based Chunghwa Post has emerged as the preferred method for shipments.The grievances over mainland interference in local politics, as well as the repression faced by Hong Kong protesters, has buoyed support for Taiwanese independence, with a majority of Taiwanese surveyed supporting the Hong Kong protesters; support for Taiwanese independence has risen more than ten points, to 88%.Helmets and other protective gear are in short supply in Hong Kong as opponents to an extradition bill to China and protesters and the police’s anti-riot squads battle for control of the streets and public spaces. Rubber bullets and tear gas canisters have been fired by police in many districts of the former British colony.Asia Times | Helmets, goggles sent from Taiwan to HK protesters [KG Chan/Asia Times](via Naked Capitalism)#Taiwan & the rest of the world are closely watching developments in the #HongKongProtests. As President of a country that walked the long road to democracy, I urge the #HongKong government to address the legitimate concerns of the people & their pursuit of freedom & democracy. Read the rest

It's been a year since Chinese social media giant Bytedance relaunched its super-popular app Musica.ly as Tiktok; the company is now valued at $75b, and in the USA it has become a serious challenge to US-based social media companies, courting a young audience (so young that it's getting into legal hot water over it).Tiktok spend $1b last year advertising in the USA, and this year it's on track to surpass that figure, with $3m/day in US ad spending. It has the power to change music trends, and has been credited with the record-breaking success of Lil Nas X's "Old Town Road," the longest run at the top of the Billboard single chart in history.The company is aggressively hiring US execs, too.But Tiktok's US rise has geopolitical implications. In China, Tiktok has been suborned to serve as a state propaganda outlet, serving anti-Hong-Kong-uprising memes to Chinese users, including conspiracy theories blaming the Hong Kong protests on US agitators (other Chinese social media companies have been serving similar content). The propaganda efforts are also intense in Xinjiang, a region where the Uighur ethnic minority have been subject to mass surveillance and torture in "re-education" camps. After a run-in with Chinese state regulators, Bytedance has pledged to hire 10,000 censors to identify and block anti-government content. But the company also faces some real risks in the near future. Here are four:One, TikTok has to fix its funnel. Too many people try TikTok, use it a few times, and never return. Read the rest

This footage of a garage on a busy road reminded me that a) life is fleeting and b) it's high time to get those dashcams installed.young kid in a truck hauling a trailer got distracted and went off the road and plowed into my friends truck. This is in spicewood TX.The vintage car under the tarp was reportedly unharmed.BONUS VIDEO: Here's a truck driver receiving "instant karma" after trying to slipstream through a toll booth behind another truck. The beam comes down and hits his cab, and his tires blow up. They get spiked, perhaps, or maybe the beam coming down made the driver veer too close to the barriers. Either way, that truck ain't goin' far. Read the rest

Shannon Byers was an investigator with the Gwinnett County (Georgia) Medical Examiner's office, until this week, when she resigned after news got out that a body whose death she had declared to be of "natural causes" had been found in a bloody murder-scene with a stab wound to the neck.Ray Neal, 61, was found in a bedroom of his home, surrounded by blood, with blood throughout the scene. When Neal's body was released to a funeral home, they discovered a stab wound in Neal's neck. This triggered an autopsy that found the cause of death to be murder by stabbing.Byers has since resigned. The County is advertising for a new medical examiner to take her place.According to the police report, Byers examined Neal’s body and determined the cause of death to be natural. The report stated Byers released the body to Byrd and Flanagan Funeral home. But the report explained, once at the funeral home, an employee noticed a hole in Neal’s neck. That’s when the Neal’s body was returned to the morgue where a further autopsy determined he had been murdered, the medical examiner’s office confirmed to FOX 5 News.Gwinnett County ME investigator resigns after misinterpreted autopsy [Fox 5 News](via Lowering the Bar) Read the rest

As hilarious as it is to see Nick Offerman deepfaked into every part in Full House, it's ctrl shift face's videos of Bill Hader subtly taking on the appearance of those he impersonates which really get under my skin. As soon as you spot it, you realize it actually started some time ago, sneaking in under the cognitive veil like a knife through the ribs. Read the rest

Entrepreneur and Product Designer Matt Benedetto is an inventing machine. Under the umbrella of "Unnecessary Inventions," he's brought the world a-mazing, and absolutely absurd, creations. His latest pièce de résistance? Fingerless Crocs Gloves. Yup, he's made Crocs that you can wear on your hands. And, no, he didn't cut up a pair of shoes. No, no. These little beauties were 3D-printed. Watch the video to see the entire process to get from idea to prototype. It's impressive! Read the rest

In the past, bowtied racist Tucker Carlson defended statutory rape, said women were "primitive" and "need to be quiet," and claimed that white people weren't "designed to digest" life alongside immigrants. Now, he says, white supremacy isn't even a thing.“It’s actually not a real problem in America,” Carlson said. He then added: “This is a hoax, just like the Russia hoax. It’s a conspiracy theory used to divide the country and keep a hold on power.” Carlson’s argument is belied by many experts and seemingly contradicted by a recent wave of deadly attacks by men motivated by those views. As The Washington Post’s Greg Miller reported on Monday, violence tied to far-right ideologies has killed roughly as many Americans since 9/11 as al-Qaeda and the Islamic State combined.Trump has faced heavy criticism for his role in stoking white racial grievances. Numerous Democratic presidential candidates denounced Trump after El Paso for boosting “white nationalism,” while polling has consistently found that most Americans believe he’s encouraged white supremacists. The president has often called Hispanic migration an “invasion” — language echoed in a manifesto police believe the accused El Paso shooter posted online decrying a “Hispanic invasion of Texas.”He's the living incarnation of that old Simpsons gag about Fox News proving how racist it was by claiming not to be racist while taking pride in its popularity with racists. UPDATE: "Tucker Carlson is literally our greatest ally." -- Neo-Nazi Andrew Anglin, The Daily Stormer.— Wajahat Ali (@WajahatAli) August 7, 2019 Read the rest

DrFakenstein: "Full House needed more Mustaches" Read the rest

Tom the Dancing Bug, IN WHICH the Russians invade, and it's up to a small resistance cell of teenagers to fight back, under the bold leadership of RED DON!

In an October 7, 2018 blog post, Tesla claimed that the Model 3 achieves the lowest probability of injury of any vehicle ever tested by NHTSA. Alas, no.NHTSA Chief Counsel Jonathan Morrison sent Tesla CEO Elon Musk a cease-and-desist letter in October last year to say it had become aware of “misleading statements” made by the company about the vehicle’s safety rating.The agency’s main contention was with Tesla’s claim in a blog post that month that NHTSA tests showed the Model 3 has “the lowest probability of injury of all cars the safety agency has ever tested.”Tldr, the agency insists that its crash ratings in the warehouse, the stars, aren't injury probabilities on the road. Here's the cease-and-decist sent to Tesla, exposed with a FOIA request. It includes a response from Al Prescott, Tesla's deputy chief counsel, telling the NHTSA it doesn't understand its own safety tests and claiming that it is "taking sides" among auto manufacturers. Read the rest

Theron of IDIDTHAT.com isn't letting old rotary phones go to waste. This Bay Area artist is repurposing them into cool lamps ($167+) whose headset is hovering in mid-air as its light source. The cord is flexible and can be repositioned as you like. Neat!They write:In the early 1970s herds of rotary phones spanned the countryside. Social by nature, the phones bred in most homes and soon every imaginable color was available. Hunting was easy! Firmly attached by a cord, trappers harvested their cases by the thousands. They were at the brink of extinction when a few cordless models got into the population. Today’s cellular phone is the result of careful breeding management. We celebrate the near extinction event, with the release of our popular recycled phone lamps in every imaginable color. Relive the 1980s or earlier and be the talk of the town. Like really, people talked on these and now they will talk about these. One customer said “Truly the coolest thing I’ve ever purchased.” View this post on Instagram (Princess and her regal consort both SOLD) Our expeditionary team returned with one of the last breeding pairs of turquoise blue phones known to exist. Behold a princess phone lamp and her regal consort in their corded glory. Several large and unnamed museums have made offers, but we just can’t see them locked in a glass case! They belong in their natural habitat, the rumpus rooms of America. Take one home today before they are forever extinct. Read the rest

The Pogues gave rise to an entirely new genre of music: Paddy Punk. For better or worse (during an interview with Spider Stacey, I was told it was the latter), thousands of bands have attempted, with varying degrees of success, to ape the Pogues' sound. In my opinion, these pretenders to the throne may sound great but they can never hope to measure up, due to two factors: They lack Shane MacGowan's dark, poetic view of the world and James Fearnley's percussive accordion playing.Here's the thing, though: unless he's singing or I've heard it before, I might not know that MacGowan wrote a particular pile of lyrics. But the moment I hear a tune being played I've no doubt that it's Fearnley minding the box. His sound rang in my ears throughout my teen years and continues to do so, today. Recently, Fearnley and a number of other notable musicians came together to form a new outfit, The Walker Roaders. From what I've heard so far, a whole LP from them should be a very fine thing.From the band's Facebook page:In the course of a widely celebrated thirty-year career, the sound of seminal London-Irish band The Pogues launched a generation of rowdy and explosive Celtic-Punk bands. James Fearnley, co-founder and long-time accordion player in that legendary group, has now teamed with two of its most notable devotees, Flogging Molly co-founder and Grammy Award-winning producer Ted Hutt and Dropkick Murphys’ multi-instrumentalist Marc Orrell, forming The Walker Roaders whose music splices anthems of Celtic-punk with the poetry of The Pogues. Read the rest

Cloud storage isn't just for big businesses. If you've got more pictures, videos or work files than your device can handle (and who doesn't?), then the cloud is where it needs to be.Luckily, there are more options for you than just Dropbox these days. Here's a roundup of some newer services that can help you manage and secure your data - not just find it a home.ThunderDrive Cloud StorageThunderDrive boasts that you can access their service six times faster than Amazon, and they've certainly got the infrastructure to back it up. Their Tier IV data centers can hold your data behind 256-bit encryption, retrievable from any browser on the web or mobile. Lifetime subscriptions include a Personal plan for 500 GB of data ($29) or Pro plan that will get you 2 TB of storage for $59, a full 95% off the MSRP.Zoolz Cloud Backup For HomeZoolz uses the Amazon Web Services infrastructure to supply 1 TB of cold storage, perfect for large amounts of inactive data. It's a great way to secure entire computers or even networks, and the service uses deduplication, block-level uploads and other methods for faster backup. Single-user plans are available for one year at $19.99 (90% off the list price) or three years at $34.99.Koofr Cloud Storage PlanHere's a handy one even if you've got an existing cloud storage account. Koofr lets you connect to Dropbox, Google Drive or other cloud storage services and transfer those files freely. Read the rest

Traffic disappears into a higher dimension, on this bridge. Witchcraft. https://t.co/9jXxSFjXv6 pic.twitter.com/yO9MaGokHy— Cliff Pickover (@pickover) August 5, 2019 Where they're going, they don't need roads. Read the rest

Winston the French bulldog fell from a six-story building in Manhattan's Lower East Side on Friday night. Fortunately, he only sustained minimal injuries and will be just fine. Emma Heinrich was walking Winston when he ran off, raced up the stairs of a building onto the roof through an open door, and then... jumped. "He managed to break his fall perfectly on top of (a) car’s closed sunroof," Heinrich wrote on Instagram. "He crashed through it and tumbled safely into the front seat." From CNN:"I was told by the vet initially that despite not having broken any bones, X-rays showed significant bruising to his lungs," Heinrich said.Due to the bruising, Winston had to stay in an oxygen chamber for 36 hours to make sure that he could breathe.Now, Winston's home and is "doing absolutely amazing," she told CNN. "He is still a little bit stiff (as to be expected), but that is quickly fading and we are seeing him start to return to his regular playful self." View this post on Instagram We now interrupt your regularly programmed negative news stories to bring you one with a miracle happy ending! *Winston is unenthused about being on the local news. He told me he won’t settle for anything less than @theellenshow moving forward.* . . Our Frenchie Winston got loose in the stairwell of our LES apartment building and managed to make it onto the roof. Trying to play a game of keepaway he dashed away from me and ran the length of the roof toward the front edge. Read the rest

A Brazilian prison inmate whose attempt to escape jail dressed as his own teen daughter went internet-viral has been found dead in his cell of an apparent hanging.Rio de Janeiro state authorities reported on Tuesday that Clauvino da Silva, 42, hung himself with a bedsheet.The convicted Rio drug dealer was serving a decades-long sentence and almost managed to escape jail last Saturday, disguised as his daughter. Authorities found him in a weird plastic mask, and a wig and women’s clothes, including a bra.From Reuters:A video, released by prison authorities, in which he slowly removes his surreal disguise went viral, shining a light on Brazil’s longstanding struggle with its violent, overcrowded prison system, the world’s third largest.On Tuesday, however, in a gruesome twist, Rio prison officials said Silva had been found dead in his cell in a high-security unit in the state’s Bangu prison complex.“The inmate appears to have hanged himself with a bed sheet,” Rio’s prison authority said in a statement, adding that an investigation had been opened.The death of Silva is an embarrassment for Rio’s prison authorities, which had initially cheered their actions in preventing his unusual escape plan. He is the latest prisoner to die in Brazil’s jails, which have become a major headache for new tough-on-crime President Jair Bolsonaro.Last week, at least 57 people died after a prison riot broke out in the northern state of Para. More than 50 inmates died in similar circumstances in May during prison riots in the northern state of Amazonas. Read the rest

Talk about a shitstorm. In Florida, a Port Charlotte woman said that lightning destroyed her septic tank, and made the toilet in her house explode.Marylou Ward, one of the property's co-owners, told local TV station WINK News that the one and only toilet in the Port Charlotte home was shattered into hundreds of pieces on Sunday.Ward told a reporter she’ll have to get the toilet and septic system repaired, but she’s grateful neither she nor anyone else was injured. The bathroom toilet was shattered into hundreds of pieces.“I’m just glad none of us were on the toilet,” Ward said. “That’s the main thing.”From WINK News in Southwest Florida:Ward and her husband are not only without a toilet, but the indoor plumbing is destroyed, along with the septic tank.The odds were not in their favor as a lightning strike, in a chain reaction, led to the septic tank to toilet explosion.“We come in here and the toilet was laying on the floor,” Ward said. “There’s all pieces everywhere. Pieces everywhere.”Their plumber said the lightning hit the methane gases from fecal matter built up in the pipes. Ward said she thought the house was on fire.“We smelled smoke and I looked outside.” Ward said. “It was the smoke from the septic tank that was coming.”[via AP] Read the rest

”AT&T employees took bribes to unlock millions of smartphones.”

From one of the longest-running homegrown “cute animal video” bloggers, kagonekoshiro -- the video you didn't know you needed right now, until you see it. Beautiful hydrangea flowers worn on the head of these cute cats, somewhere in Japan on a warm summer's day.Watch:A related gem from the same channel:[source, youtube link] Read the rest

You're gonna want to unmute for the happycrys.This video is pretty amazing. “Daughter was with grandma for a month and we got the kitten a week ago I told her we have a gift for her and wanted to make sure she didn’t suspect it’s a kitten,” says IMGURian romansamurai.My daughter’s reaction to our new kitten. Daughter was with grandma for a month and we got the kitten a week ago I told her we have a gift for her and wanted to make sure she didn’t suspect it’s a kitten.My daughter’s reaction to our new kitten [IMGUR] Read the rest

Over at Medium's Forge, Nicole Dieker writes about her experiment testing the $200 Pavlok 2 electronic shock bracelet as a way to help herself cut down on checking social media. From Forge:Giving myself more time to think and focus pays off; according to RescueTime, I’ve been consistently beating my productivity averages since I began the experiment.The next two days are weekend days, and I don’t even check social media then. I am very excited to add up to three hours back in Saturday leisure time.I never hit my 30-minute limit, but I still shock myself a few times (at 50%, never 100%) when I feel the urge to check social media, as instructed in the the Pavlok 2 How-To Guide.I probably shocked myself fewer than 10 times that weekend, but by Sunday evening my left arm develops a lingering soreness. That’s where I tell the Milgram-esque experimenter in my head that I’m done; I’ll let the Pavlok shock me if I go beyond 30 minutes of social media time, but that’s it. Read the rest

An electric-eel-powered Tesla? Jason Torchinsky does the math at Jalopnik.We can get a jolt of 600 watts from an eel, but only for one hundredth of a second, and we can get up to 50 of these pulses per second. With each eel giving 50 pulses of 0.01 seconds, then we could use two to get a full second of electricity. At 600 watts, that would take 2.4 times to equal the wall outlet’s 1,440 watts.And that means if 1,440 watts give four miles per hour and 5.85 feet per second, then we can reasonably expect—since the charging rates seem pretty linear, that our 600 watts will give us 2.44 feet per second of eel-charging.That’s about 146 feet per minute, and 8,784 feet per hour, or about 1.66 miles per hour of eel-charging.Image: Jalopnik/Jason Torchinsky Read the rest

Zupagrafika's new book Eastern Blocks (subtitle: "Concrete Landscapes of the Former Eastern Bloc") collects more than 100 beautiful photos of the brutalist towers of ex-Soviet nations, "‘Sleeping districts’ of Moscow, Plattenbauten of East Berlin, modernist estates of Warsaw, Kyiv`s Brezhnevki."David Navarro and Martyna Sobecka (AKA Zupagrafika) started photographing the towers as design reference for their studios but soon fell in love with brutalism itself and began commissioning photographers around the region to take pictures for the book.Wired has a smashing gallery of images from the book, which retails for €19.Eastern Blocks: Concrete Landscapes of the Former Eastern Bloc [Zupagrafika]Ugly or Beautiful? The Housing Blocks Communism Left Behind [Laura Mallonee/Wired] Read the rest

Officially, Americas total 2017 corporate lobbying group spending was $535m, but as much as $675m more was funneled from industry groups to politicians as part of influence campaigns.Maplight found the off-the-books spending by data-mining the tax returns of more than 100 501(c)(6) nonprofits -- a special tax designation for trade groups, from the US Chamber of Commerce to the Washington State Society of Anesthesiologists. Nonprofits tax returns are public. By looking for line-items like "'advocacy,' 'consulting,' 'contributions,' 'coalitions,' 'consortiums,' 'government affairs,' 'communications,' 'programs,' 'special projects,' 'dues,' 'memberships,' and 'subscriptions'," Maplight was able to identify influence money that was not counted because it was laundered through other organizations. For example, the trade group America’s Health Insurance Plans (AHIP) funneled $100m to the Chamber of Commerce to fund anti-Obamacare lobbying, but marked up the funds as "advocacy," not "lobbying."There's lots of incredibly vague, high-ticket stuff buried in these tax-returns, spending on "other fees for services" and "other expenses," while other line-items are a little more explicit, like "coalition expenditures" ($1.5m, Financial Services Roundtable) "policy research and consulting" ($4m, Chamber of Commerce), "consulting" ($82m, Phrma), "strategic planning" ($9.2m, American Fuel and Petrochemical Manufacturers), etc.Nonprofits are only required to itemize their “other fees for services” if they account for more than 10 percent of their total functional expenses, which offers some trade associations an additional avenue for secrecy. For example, since the American Hospital Association listed more than $126 million in total functional expenses in 2017, it didn’t need to spell out any of the items included in its $12 million line for “other fees for services.”Last year, the health care industry launched the Partnership for America’s Health Care Future, or PAHCF, a 501(c)(4) dark-money organization, to oppose growing momentum for Medicare for All or more limited reforms. Read the rest

Ishu Patel's 1977 animated film, "The Bead Game," uses thousands of colored beads as pixels to show animals eating each other, giving birth, fighting, and evolving.From The National Film Board of Canada:In this fascinating, innovative exercise in animation, thousands of beads are arranged and manipulated, assuming shapes of creatures both mythical and real. They continually devour, merge, and absorb one another in explosions of color. The theme is one of aggression and inevitability, but any conclusion is left to the viewer.See also: Using colored beads to remind yourself that you will die soon[via Aeon] Read the rest

A man in Almeria, Spain, disposed of an old fridge by throwing it down a steep incline. Thinking it amusing, he had video recorded of the act and posted to social media. It went viral, the authorities found out about it, and he has now been fined—and ordered to retrieve the fridge.He was fined €45,000 (£41,000; $50,000) and made to dispose of the appliance appropriately. An associate of the man filmed the fly-tipping incident and is heard in the clip joking about recycling as the fridge tumbles down the cliff. "We're going to recycle it!" he said. "How many twists and turns has it done?"Fifty thousand dollars for fly tipping! Not fucking around in Spain, are they? Read the rest

In a new column in the LA Times, business columnist Michael Hiltzik makes the argument that the only thing health insurers have done with any effectiveness is scare us into thinking that the socialized medicine services that every other advanced country has will not work in America.Insurers are not even good at being profitable: the waves of mergers and acquisitions that has resulted in mass-scale concentration in the health insurance sector resulted in billions in losses, the bill for which was passed on in the form of higher premiums.Hiltzik cites the work of Wendell Potter (previously), the Cigna exec who defected to the public's side of the health-care debate and is an excellent source of inside dirt on how dysfunctional and profit-driven the health-care industry is. It's Potter who identifies the industry's most valuable, reliable product as scare stories about socialized medicine, with actual health-care provision lagging far behind. The health insurance industry’s most telling contribution to the debate over healthcare reform has been “to scare people about other healthcare systems,” Potter told me. As a consequence, discussions about whether or how to remove private companies from the healthcare system are chiefly political, not practical.The Affordable Care Act allowed private insurers to continue playing a role in delivering coverage not because they were any good at it but because their wealth and size made them formidable adversaries to reform if they chose to fight it. They were sufficiently mollified to remain out of the fray, but some of the big insurers then did their best to undermine the individual insurance exchanges once they were launched in 2015. Read the rest

Brian Kozlowski poisoned his wife repeatedly by pouring massive amounts of diphenhydramine into her coffee when he she wasn't looking. But the woman installed a hidden camera in the kitchen and recorded him in the act. With the tape as evidence, Kozlowski was found guilty and the judge sentenced him to spend weekends in jail for the next several months. When the prosecuting attorney complained about the sentence being a slap in the face to the victim, the judge told her "Counsel, I do not let anybody speak after I've issued a judgment."From Oddity Central:“Brian was trying to kill me to keep his comfortable life from slipping away,” Therese told WDIV. “I felt a horrible coldness in the air, but in this nightmare the predator was Brian. I fell to my knees and cried. I could barely move.”Therese moved out and notified her divorce attorney about the grim discovery as soon as she saw the video of Brian mixing the pills with her coffee. Authorities were able to seize the last coffee he made for her and found that it contained 127 millilitres of diphenhydramine, about eight pills-worth. The woman said that she got suspicious after experiencing weird symptoms after drinking her husband’s coffee, symptoms like tiredness, nausea and blurred vision.Faced with irrefutable proof of his crime, Brian Kozlowski pleaded no contest to charges of poisoning a drink, which carries a maximum sentence of 15 years, instead settling for excuses, as the fact that he was going though a rough time when he committed the act. Read the rest

I bought How to Draw Comics the Marvel Way by Stan Lee and John Buscema when it came out in 1978, and I think it might still be the best how-to-draw book I've used. It covers a lot of territory in 160 pages - perspective, figure drawing, action, foreshortening, heads and faces, and composition. I found the last section, composition to be the most interesting.I lost my first edition, but it has stayed in print so in 2010 I bought a new copy. As far as I can tell, it is exactly the same as the original.Amazon has it on sale right now for Read the rest

The photo shows two white police officers, on horseback, leading a roped black detainee through the streets. Galveston police chief Vernon Hale apologized, after it went viral, but said there was "no malicious intent" and that "the technique was acceptable in some scenarios." The BBC: "According to a news release from the Galveston Police Department, the two mounted officers, named only as P Brosch and A Smith, arrested Donald Neely for criminal trespass. The officers were taking Mr Neely to a police staging area. Police clarified that he was not tied with the rope, but 'was handcuffed and a line was clipped to the handcuffs"'". Read the rest

The second-bloodiest riot in the history of New York was touched off by a dispute between two Shakespearean actors. Their supporters started a brawl that killed as many as 30 people and changed the institution of theater in American society. In this week's episode of the Futility Closet podcast we'll tell the story of the Astor Place riot, "one of the strangest episodes in dramatic history."We'll also fertilize a forest and puzzle over some left-handed light bulbs.Show notesPlease support us on Patreon! Read the rest

A Connecticut woman called 911 and told the operator she was locked in the luggage compartment of a moving bus. Police tracked the bus down, pulled it over, and found the woman inside. The woman said the driver, Wendy Helena Alberty (49), had intentionally locked her in the compartment while she was getting her luggage out.Alberty was arrested on charges of unlawful restraint, reckless endangerment, and breach of peace.From NBC News:Alberty has been with the company since 2012 and previously had an "exemplary" employment record, according to Peter Pan [bus line]."Over her tenure she has received many customer commendations for her safe driving and customer service," according to a company statement.Image: Shutterstock Read the rest

The nice woodchipper in West Pittston, Pa., was replaced in the night with a less nice model. Police say they don't know who stole the nice one, but if you do, they'd like to hear from you.If anyone can identify the owner of this wood chipper please contact the West Pittston Police. They dropped this wood chipper off at the West Pittston Public Works Department and stole the Borough’s wood chipper. If you know the person(s) who owned this wood chipper please call the West Pittston Police Chief Michael Turner at 570-655-7780 ext. 306 or you can send a Facebook message and you will remain anonymous. Thank you. Read the rest

Kathryn Kidd's neighbors in LA think her bright pink and yellow emoji-daubed house is an eyesore. Kidd disagrees.Neighbors say it’s retribution in a property dispute that has turned into a battle with the city. A neighbor reported the home’s owner, Kathryn Kidd, to the city for using the property for short-term rentals, such as Airbnb, which is illegal in Manhattan Beach. Now the property is painted bright pink with yellow emojis.Frustrated homeowners and renters in the El Porto neighborhood plan to raise their concerns again at a City Council meeting Tuesday night, marking the latest chapter of a saga that began in May. It was first reported by Easy Reader News.It's the artwork of Z the Art, who maintains an insta feed.THE EMOJI HOUSE 🤐🤪 🎨 @ztheart#TheEmojiHouse#theemojihouse #emojiart #beachfrontproperty #art #beachlife #Manhattanbeach #artdaily #pink #emoji #selfie #eyelashextensions #eyelashes #ladypink #artcommission #comissionart #wallart #exteriordesign #funnyart View this post on Instagram Rpost from the @thegoneman THE EMOJI HOUSE 🤐🤪 🎨 @ztheart #TheEmojiHouse #theemojihouse #emojiart #beachfrontproperty #art #beachlife #Manhattanbeach #artdaily #pink #emoji #selfie #eyelashextensions #eyelashes #ladypink #artcommission #comissionart #wallart #exteriordesign #funnyartA post shared by Z the Art (@ztheart) on May 31, 2019 at 5:25pm PDT Read the rest

A French neonatal specialist named Dr Arnaud Gagneur has created a "vaccine counselling" program within Quebec's health-care system that uses a non-judgmental technique called "motivational interviewing" with parents of newborns to allay their fears about vaccines.The program doesn't target anti-vax or vaccine denial, but rather, "vaccine hesitancy," in which parents with a cursory awareness of anti-vax talking points infer (reasonably enough) that if there's a lot of controversy about vaccines, there might be some reason to be concerned about it. Anti-vax talking points about taking "too many vaccines at once" or the disproven links between vaccination and autism, as well as inaccurate scare stories about mercury and live viruses, can seem plausible to a casual observer.The "motivational interviewing" technique draws parents out about their concerns. They don't tell parents that their fears are wrong, but when the parents have finished expressing their fears, they reply with the best scientific evidence of actual known side-effects of vaccines; the known facts about Andrew Wakefield's fraudulent study linking autism with vaccination; and the best evidence about the benefits of vaccination. They tell the parents that their concerns reflect a desire to protect their kids and keep them healthy, and make a connection between vaccination and health.The nonjudgmental approach is crucial, but so is the timing: the counsellors talk to parents months before their children's first scheduled vaccination, giving them lots of time to think this over, so the parents aren't feeling cornered when their pediatricians call them up to schedule that first round of shots. Read the rest