Maggie's Farm

I'm supposed to read the papers and paste some of the more interesting items on this page for you to peruse. We're all supposed to have a few laughs, go tsk, tsk, or on the odd occasion, applaud what we see. Today I was brought up short, as they say. Like a baby midget in the circus. I'm still capable of being shocked, I guess. The papers are full of man's inhumanity to man these last few days, but nothing about a terrorist attack surprises me anymore. Doesn't even move the meter, I'm ashamed to say.

It was more the mundane aspect of the depravity I discovered that got to me. The everyday humdrum attitude that everyone seems to have about it, like it was traffic or inclement weather. I found myself on the KTLA5 webpage while I was looking for something. I gather that KTLA serves the eastern part of Los Angeles, mostly. Here's a list of the headlines I found on one page, all labeled "Local News":

Downey Police Officer Apparently Targeted in Fatal Shooting in Station Parking Lot

Suspected Carjacker Fatally Shot by Deputies After Allegedly Taking Hostages at Downey Restaurant

Firefighter Fatally Shoots Wife, a Sheriff’s Deputy, in Apparent Murder-Suicide: LASD

Man Holding Knife to Hostage’s Neck in Front of Burning El Monte Home Shot by Police

Suspect in Killing of Woman Found Buried in Valinda Yard Is Fugitive Santeria Priest Accused of Rape

2 Found Dead, Others Injured After Shooting Spree in Banning; Man in Custody: Police

Fresno County ‘Murder Suspect’ Arrested in El Monte on Rape Charge: Authorities

Human Remains, Including Skull, Found at Valinda Home During Dig Linked to Missing Person Case

L.A. County Firefighter Suspected in Sexual Assault Case Arrested Near El Monte School: Police

Man Arrested After Allegedly Filming at Least 7 People in Brea Starbucks Bathroom

Teen Charged After Allegedly Raping 72-Year-Old Woman at Senior Living Apartment Complex in Huntington Beach

The Newspaper neglected to mention that the "fugitive Santeria priest" suspected of murder had raped a child. All the news that fits, I guess, and the fact that the rape victim was a child can't compete with everything else the headline has going on.

I can't say I blame the news organization. They have a lot of ground to cover. I didn't even bother listing all the plain old murders I found on that page. There was a kind of monotony to them. The KTLA news page even tried to get me to pay attention to a car wreck. That doesn't even register as bad news to me anymore after reading the rest of the happenings from one little corner of our world.

Well, don't worry, you can count on me to keep bringing you the news, but as soon as I'm done, I'm shaving my head, putting on flowing robes, and fashioning a placard that reads REPENT, THE WORLD WILL END TOMORROW. You'll find me out on the sidewalk, waving at passing cars, and apologizing to everyone for not making the sign 50 years ago when it would have been timely.

A Florida State University researcher has discovered an artificial material that mimics photosynthesis and potentially creates a sustainable energy source.

His discovery generates exciting new prospects for how this process could be used to forge new energy sources in a carbon neutral way. Potentially, hydrogen could be transported to other locations and burned as fuel.“In theory, this should be a self-sustaining energy source,” Mendoza-Cortes said. “Perhaps in the future, you could put this material on your roof and it could turn rain water into energy with the help of the sun.”But, unlike many other energy sources, this won’t have a negative effect on the environment. “You won’t generate carbon dioxide or waste,” he said.

I see. He's terrified of producing a beneficial trace gas, or any "waste." He will, however, propose the mining of lots of manganese, a material that causes permanent neurological disorders, tremors, facial muscle spasms, difficulty walking, acute bronchitis, aggressiveness, and hallucinations. But he'll make enough juice to charge his phone, so it's all good.

UnitedHealth may exit Obamacare individual exchanges

UnitedHealth Group Inc raised new questions about the viability of Obamacare on Thursday, saying that in 2017 it might stop selling individual plans on the insurance exchanges created under U.S. President Barack Obama's healthcare law.

I don't have any questions about the viability of Obamacare, and never did, but thanks for playing.

Cab medallion owners sue NYC, blame Uber for ruining business

Owners of New York City's taxi "medallions" filed a lawsuit (PDF) against city regulators today, saying their business has been devastated by the decision to allow companies like Uber to compete using "E-hail" services. A medallion is required to operate a New York City yellow taxicab, the only type of vehicle allowed to accept passengers who hail cabs on the street. Until recently, those medallions could sell for over $1 million. Companies like White & Blue Group, one of the plaintiffs in the case, managed fleets of licensed taxicabs by leasing out the medallions.

Here's an errand for you, kind reader. Apply for a permit to do anything in New York City. Then tell the person behind the counter you don't need to fill out any forms, or pay any fees, because you wrote 200 lines of javascript, frosted it with a little html, and pasted it into your phone. I promise I'll drag the river to find you.

Students want Woodrow Wilson's name removed from Princeton

Princeton President Christopher Eisgruber told the students he agreed with them that Wilson was racist and that the university needs to acknowledge that, according to a video posted to YouTube. But a school spokesman said the president also told students it is important to weigh Wilson's racism, and how bad it was, with the contributions he made to the nation.

Let's make a deal, college kids. I'll help you jackhammer his name off the building if you'll help me erase his signature from the Revenue Act of 1913.

Help! My short position got crushed, and now I owe E-Trade $106,445.56

When you’re long, the worst you can do is lose is everything. But when you’re short, everything and a lot more is at stake. He should have known better, no doubt, but you have to feel for this poor guy. This is what apparently happened, as Joe explains in his GoFundMe plea. “I was holding KBIO short overnight for what I thought was a nice $2.00 fade coming,” he wrote. “At the close of the bell I saw the quote montage clear out and figured today there was no action after hours in the stock. So I went to my office for a long meeting. I got out of the meeting and saw a message from one of my buddy’s, he asked if I was ok since I was short KBIO.”

I have no sympathy -- none -- for a college graduate that can't pluralize "buddy."

Doctors want ban on prescription drug, device advertisements

On Tuesday, the American Medical Association (AMA) called for a ban on direct-to-consumer advertisements for prescription drugs and medical devices. Such ads drive demand and costs for expensive name-brand treatments when those drugs may not be appropriate or when clinically effective, low-cost options are available, the doctors group said. The announcement is part of a larger effort by the association to make prescription drugs more affordable.

I have only one observation. If a man and a woman are in separate bathtubs, no amount of medication will initiate sexual activity between them. That's a cast iron fact.

Forget paleo, go mid-Victorian: it’s the healthiest diet you’ve never heard of

The implications of a better understanding of mid-Victorian health are profound. It becomes clear that, with the exception of family planning, the vast edifice of post-1948 healthcare has not so much enabled us to live longer but has merely supplied methods of controlling the symptoms of non-communicable degenerative diseases, which have become prevalent due to our failure to maintain mid-Victorian nutritional standards. Dysnutrition is arguably the largest cause of ill-health today.

Sounds great. I'm all for a return to mid-Victorian Napier-style foreign policy, too: "Come here instantly. Come here at once and make your submission, or I will in a week tear you from the midst of your village and hang you."

Why the VW #DieselGate Is Only the Tip of the Iceberg, Part 2

There are of course some things that one could not have predicted. For example, it now seems that this scandal might be part of a broader “era of cheating software”, including everything from slot machines to voting machines, as well as an EU probe of TV makers into “Volkswagening” their energy efficiency test scores.

I have another theory. The emissions rules to limit CO2 are stupid and unattainable, and Volkswagen workers had to choose between fibbing and mass ritual suicide in the parking lot.

Half of New Yorkers Say They Are Barely or Not Getting By, Poll Shows

The poll, conducted by The New York Times and Siena College, shows great disparities in quality of life among the city’s five boroughs. The stresses weighing on New Yorkers vary widely, from the Bronx, where residents feel acute concern about access to jobs and educational opportunity, to Staten Island, where one in five report recently experiencing vandalism or theft.

Half say they are barely getting by, and the other half didn't hear the question because their head is in the oven.

My Home-Built TTL Computer Processor (CPU)

This processor that I designed and built is an accumulator-memory machine, that is, a single register is used in programming. I wanted an instruction set similar to those of the 8-bit microprocessors I was used to. However, the Z-80 and 6502 CPUs had complex instruction sets, with variable instruction lengths. I knew from experience that a programmer uses only a subset of these, so I designed an instruction set that was similar to this commonly-used subset. It has 16 instructions in all, with eight arithmetic-logical operations, and eight data movement and jump instructions.

That is a nifty piece of work. After the zombie apocalypse, he'll be an emperor-god because he'll be the only man on Earth able to program an LED register to show the vague outlines of a naked woman.

Well, that should tide you over until tomorrow. Remember, Maggies Farm loves you and wants you to be happy, so if by some twist of fate you accidentally enter the broadcast area for KTLA, roll up the windows, lock the doors, and keep driving.

We used to be rather better at this cloak and dagger stuff. 

Perhaps it was because we were all sure we were on the same team back in the day. Kennedy was a bit of a dolt compared to Eisenhower, but he wasn't any kind of friend to the commies. The Bay of Pigs was about as dumb an attempt at exercising American power as you could come up with, but he didn't mess it up on purpose because he was secretly hoping the other side would win. I'm not sure you can count on that brand of My mother, drunk or sober patriotism anymore.

Not too many years earlier, Eisenhower was able to go on national television and admit he was the one that sent Francis Gary Powers to spy on the Soviet Union from the edge of space. He knew that everyone on the other side of the aisle wouldn't impeach him over it. It was, after all, in the United States' best interest. Well, if it worked it was.

While terrorists are raging all over the landscape, our intelligence experts are busy in nondescript buildings in Virginia rifling through Tea Party tax returns. Anyone that understands opportunity cost knows that when some tasks get done to the last jot and tittle, others get the back burner. The Rumford Meteor japed that the massacre in Paris had an effect: France Finally Uses the List of Terrorists They’ve Been Keeping at the Bottom of a Locked Filing Cabinet Stuck in a Disused Lavatory With a Sign on the Door Saying Beware of the Leopard

If that's funny, it's because it's true. France had a list of 168 locations they had identified as possible terrorist hideouts. They used the list to conduct raids the day after the bloodbath. What exactly was a more important use of their time the day before the massacre? Putting someone in the clink for working 36 hours a week?

Even the entertainment about dealing with an implacable enemy used to be better. I'm sick of rogue CIA agents. I long for the good old days of CIA agents who were rogues. Not the same thing, is it?

On to today's news:

Homeschooled with MIT courses at 5, accepted to MIT at 15

“When I was five years old my mom told me ‘there’s this thing called OCW,’” says Rungta, who was homeschooled. “I just couldn’t believe how much material was available. From that moment on I spent the next few years taking OCW courses.” When most kids are entering kindergarten, Rungta was studying physics and chemistry through OpenCourseWare. For Rungta’s mother, the biggest challenge to homeschooling her son was staying ahead of him, finding courses and materials to feed his insatiable mind.

C'mon, admit it. Public School is obsolete. It serves only as an academy for depravity at this point.

Police Civil Asset Forfeitures Exceed All Burglaries in 2014

Between 1989 and 2010, U.S. attorneys seized an estimated $12.6 billion in asset forfeiture cases. The growth rate during that time averaged +19.4% annually. In 2010 alone, the value of assets seized grew by +52.8% from 2009 and was six times greater than the total for 1989. Then by 2014, that number had ballooned to roughly $4.5 billion for the year, making this 35% of the entire number of assets collected from 1989 to 2010 in a single year. According to the FBI, the total amount of goods stolen by criminals in 2014 burglary offenses suffered an estimated $3.9 billion in property losses. This means that the police are now taking more assets than the criminals.

Yeah, and the burglars are 100 percent less likely to shoot your dog.

Is Sex Once A Week Enough For A Happy Relationship?

"This showed a linear association between sex and happiness up to a frequency of once a week, but at higher frequencies there is no longer an association," Amy Muise, a social psychologist at the University of Toronto Mississauga who led the research, said in an email. "Therefore it is not necessary, on average, for couples to aim to engage in sex as frequently as possible."

Once a week? Maybe. I'll reserve judgment until they clarify whether that means at least two people are in the room.

Addyi, Libido-Boosting Pill For The Ladies, Not A Big Hit

Once the Food and Drug Administration approved Addyi, a failed antidepressant repackaged as a libido pill for women, drug-maker Valeant Pharmaceuticals bought the company selling Addyi for $1 billion. If they were expecting to cash in on a blockbuster drug, early sales aren’t very promising: in the first month, only 227 prescriptions for the drug have been written.

You're not allowed to drink alcohol when taking this drug. No one's getting any action under those circumstances. 

A Missed Business Opportunity: Senior Centers That Are Actually Fun

In the U.S., senior care is not something many entrepreneurs are thinking creatively about. Not so in Japan: In the past year, 60 gambling-themed senior-daycare centers have opened up, giving some of the nation’s elderly not just basic shelter, but a place to spend time that’s appealing and fun.

You mean Foxwoods and Mohegan Sun aren't nursing homes?

Writers in the Storm: How weather went from symbol to science and back again.

When we first meet Catherine Earnshaw, she is a ghostly hand rapping on a window in a storm—which is to say, she is essentially the storm itself, rattling the glass panes of her former home. At every point thereafter, emotional drama and atmospheric drama are one. If Lear is minded like the weather, Catherine and Heathcliff are bodied like it—together, the most famous storm ever to strike the Yorkshire moors.

There's always plenty of weather in bodice rippers. Otherwise Fabio's pectorals wouldn't glisten with sweat as his hands slowly made their way up inside her chemise, the faint aroma of the sodden garden surrounding them like the perfume of Aphrodite, and all that sh*t. 

Philly cop arrested for attacking Dunkin Donuts employee, bystander

Philadelphia police said Officer Joseph Marion, 39, was outside of a Dunkin Donuts on Wadworth Avenue on Feb. 14 when an employee lost control of a shopping cart he using was to put down salt.The cart hit Marion's vehicle, spurring Marion to get out and start attacking the employee. Marion also allegedly assaulted a woman who intervened in the initial attack. 

In his defense, he did say, "No sprinkles."

The First Taco Bell Will Be Saved from Demolition!

When executives at Taco Bell found out that the Downey building that housed their first restaurant was at risk of being demolished, they ordered the store “to go.” The birthplace of the Mexican fast food chain, located on Firestone Boulevard, is up on rails and ready to roll. Founder Glen Bell built the mission style building in 1962 and on Thursday night at 10:30, store “Numero Uno” will begin the 45-mile ride to company headquarters in Irvine.

I'm fairly certain the first and only taco I ate at Taco Bell hasn't moved an inch since I swallowed it.

Man jailed over music piracy website

Rocky Ouprasith, now 23, was the man behind RockDizMusic.com and RockDizFile.com. The latter was the second-largest online file-sharing site specialising in pirated music in the United States in 2013, according to the Recording Industry Association of America. Federal law enforcement shut down the sites in October 2014, and Ouprasith pleaded guilty to one count of criminal copyright infringement in August. In addition to a 36-month prison term, he will also get two years of supervised release, forfeit over US$50,000 and pay nearly US$50,000 in restitution.

No one should ever go to jail for copyright infringement, which is a civil violation, or should be. Same goes for tax evasion. If you can't collect the money upfront, willingly, you're not entitled to it. Jailing people for owing money is medieval.

The Double Life of John le Carré

John le Carré, one of England’s greatest novelists, author of The Spy Who Came In From the Cold and creator of the character George Smiley, was born David Cornwell in 1931 in Poole, England. He was 2 when his father—who was always either booming or busting, expanding and contracting to the rhythm of his own dodginess—got 15 months for fraud and other charges. “He could put a hand on your shoulder and the other in your pocket and both gestures would be equally sincere,” David’s brother Tony once said.

"The Spy Who Came In From the Cold" with Richard Burton and Claire Bloom is the best spy movie ever made. Discuss.

Look, I know you mean well, and some of you look quite fetching in a lab coat, horn rims, and high heels, but I am not interested in your "studies." You do not seem to have studied anything but grievances in school, yet you publish studies by the ream as soon as you escape. I do not care a fig if you think my cell phone is giving cancer to my autism. I am not all that interested in your theories about the correlation of causation with the cessation of sensation in my foot as I drop off to sleep at night.

I sleep when I'm tired and I eat when I'm hungry and I drink when I'm thirsty and I read when I'm curious and I wonder what you're on about. If you've got evidence, trot it out, but I warn you I'm going to want to inspect your test tubes before I throw away my office chair and sit on a beach ball.

Now, on to today's studies:

Drink To Your Health: Study Links Daily Coffee Habit To Longevity

"In our study, we found people who drank three to five cups of coffee per day had about a 15 percent lower [risk of premature] mortality compared to people who didn't drink coffee," says one of the study authors, nutrition researcher Walter Willett of the Harvard School of Public Health. Decaf drinkers also saw benefits.

This article is only sorta-correct. It's true you'll live longer if you don't get in my way when I'm trying to get coffee.

The twisted tale of the man who stole Albert Einstein's brain

Harvey hadn't snatched the brain for the morbid fascination of keeping a part of history the same way some collectors have done with Annie Oakley's gun or Neil Armstrong's hair. Instead, Harvey was hoping to learn whether or not Einstein's genius could be quantified. Was his brain somehow wired differently than ours? Gutfreund dismisses that line of research. "I don't know," he says. "Your brain is different than my brain. There are no two brains alike."

This is the equivalent of breaking into a bank to steal the deposit slips. Ted Williams frozen head is never going to bat .400, either.

What would the life of an average American look like without access to the most basic necessity?

But the truth is there are 2.5 billion people globally who lack access to even the very basic necessities of sanitation, cleanliness and safe water — that's twice the population of the U.S.World Toilet Day is November 19, and aims to raise awareness about the global issue of poor sanitation around the world. We ask: What would your life look like if you had to exist without access to clean water? To a hot shower? To a private, indoor toilet?

Another paid advertisement masquerading as a news article, but I'll play along: America doesn't have "access" to water. We have a population of capable humans who consider an inexpensive supply of potable water for its citizens to be an important, if trivial, undertaking, and then makes it happen. Well, except California.

Smart Cup Pryme Launches To Track Your Hydration, But It Doesn’t Always Work

I’ve consistently experienced connectivity issues between the cup and the app on my iPhone. Sometimes the app wouldn’t recognize the cup, so I’d have to physically reset the cup in order for it to work. I had to do that at least 10 times over the last couple of weeks. It was pretty frustrating, so I ended up not using Pryme for about a week until last night. I, once again, reset the cup and then connected it via Bluetooth to my phone. It worked fine until I woke up this morning and tilted the cup to look at my Pryme level. According to the cup, I was at my Pryme, even though I hadn’t had any water for the previous several hours. Sigh.

Yet another fake ad, but I'll play along. This woman believes she needs a handheld supercomputer wirelessly attached to an electronic cup in order to get herself a drink of water. She's the target audience for the last fake article, I imagine.

How Early Exit Disease Stunts The Growth Of Midwest Startup Communities

There is an unnamed epidemic slowly traveling through the middle of the U.S. This epidemic goes by many names, but our venture fund refers to it as “early exit disease.” This disease spreads when founders realize sub-$20 million exits. Many of these exits could have grown much larger. Instead, early exits have been quietly devastating the Midwest region’s startup maturation, cutting off the very process that first created Silicon Valley — and which could create more tech capitals in the middle of the country.

The article says startup owners are cashing out before they've sufficiently bilked investors out of enough money to fund still more startups. Welcome to the fabulous new iAmway economy!

The Forgotten Midwest Craze for Building Palaces Out of Grain

The first, built in 1887, was Sioux City’s corn palace, which spanned more than 18,000 square feet, rose 100 feet high and cost $25,000–hundreds of thousands in today’s dollars. In the year it was built, a drought had devastated crops across the middle of the country. But for some reason, Sioux City's part of Iowa was spared and even had an excess of corn. The city wanted to signal that life in the Midwest wasn't as dreary and desperate as it might seem, and, as Pamela H. Simpson writes in Corn Palaces and Butter Queens, the idea for the palace came from a town meeting, at which one enterprising man asked “why, if Saint Paul and Toronto could have ice palaces, Sioux City couldn’t have a corn palace.”

The United States has always been an endlessly interesting place, and continues to be so.

Bicycles lighting the night in Venice Beach (video feature)

What happens when you apply thousands of LED lights to a bicycle? You fit right in with Venice, California locals. Venice Beach, which served as a US hippy hub of the 1960s, is now seeing dozens of locals cruising its boardwalk late at night with brightly glowing rides.

The United States has always been an endlessly interesting place, and continues to be so.

Bobby Jindal Quits Republican Presidential Race

Mr. Jindal unveiled a series of policy proposals, ferociously attacked Donald J. Trump and spent considerable time courting conservatives in Iowa, which begins the presidential nominating process. None of it worked.

If a couple more Republican candidates quit, they're not going to be able to field a baseball team.

Spectator attacks linesman with his penis at football match in Spain

A disgruntled crowd member stormed the pitch and hit an assistant referee with his penis during a football match in southern Spain. The incident occurred during a match between Second Division Andaluza Sénior and fellow Andalusian team CD Abes in Granada on Sunday.

I've noticed that gruntled people never attack anyone with their penis.

DNA Reveals Mysterious Human Cousin With Huge Teeth

The analysis of a fossil tooth from Siberia reveals that a mysterious people known as Denisovans, discovered a mere five years ago, persisted for tens of thousands of years alongside modern humans and Neanderthals.The find underscores that our Homo sapiens ancestors shared the Eurasian continent with other human-like populations. For hundreds of thousands of years, modern humans lived alongside Neanderthals, a sister hominid species that died out about 40,000 years ago. Denisovans appear to have shared some of that territory as well.

I know they're scientists, but I doubt I'm related to Julia Roberts.

Well, there you go. If I were you, I'd blow off work, get hopped up on pots of coffee, build a house out of corn shucks, and then ride a bicycle covered with LEDs in circles around it. If you don't, the terrorists have won.

Since the entire world has quickly settled on singing a dreary, infantile ditty written by a wife-beater that extols the state religion of Nazi Germany and the USSR as a response to an existential threat, I guess it's time to move on to new topics. Speaking of existential, didn't those Frenchmen invent existentialism? No, I think that was Kierkegaarde. Maybe it was Nietzsche. Whatever. It was one of those grouchy fellows. I was doodling in my copybook and trying to get a peek down a girl's blouse that day in school, and must have missed it. At any rate, Europe is just a bunch of zebras at the watering hole watching a lion eat their little sister while mumbling, "Wasn't me, don't care." Who am I to bother about it? Let's read the papers:

Why France will do nothing about the Paris Massacre: Spengler 

Ignored in news coverage of the Paris massacre is the single most pertinent piece of background:  A 2014 opinion poll found that ISIS had an approval rating in France (at 16%) almost as high as President Francois Holland (at 18%). In the 18-to-24-year-old demographic, ISIS’ support jumped to 27%. Muslims comprise about a tenth of France’s population, so the results imply that ISIS had the support of the overwhelming majority of French Muslims (and especially Muslim youth), as well as the endorsement of a large part of the non-Muslim Left.

Like Obama, Hollande looks at terror attacks through the lens of self-interest. If it affects their personal reputation, they get peevish and start talking like a fop's idea of Audie Murphy. Otherwise, they really don't give a sh*t.

Anonymous Declares Cyber War on ISIS. Why It Matters

Hacker collective Anonymous posted a video Saturday on YouTube in which it declared a cyber war on ISIS. In the nearly two-and-a-half-minute video, a person wearing the group’s signature Guy Fawkes mask read a statement in French promising that the hacktivist organization would attack ISIS in cyberspace with the ultimate goal of weakening the terrorist organization.

I'm sure a multinational terrorist organization is shaking in their sandals over the prospect of a deluge of fake one-star reviews on Yelp.

How Snowmaking Works

Machine made snow is made up of exactly the same stuff as natural snow - frozen water. When the weather provides cold temperatures, but no moisture, our snowmaking team simply adds just the right amount of moisture to the atmosphere to produce excellent snow. It may sound easy, but making great snow requires millions of dollars in specialized equipment and an experienced team of snowmakers.

In my experience, machine snow is half-frozen filthy retaining pond water sprayed all over you if you deign to ski on a weekday.

The problem isn't that life is unfair — it's that you don't know the rules

Society judges people by what they can do for others. Can you save children from a burning house, or remove a tumor, or make a room of strangers laugh? You've got value right there. That's not how we judge ourselves though. We judge ourselves by our thoughts."I'm a good person." "I'm ambitious." "I'm better than this." These idle impulses may comfort us at night, but they're not how the world sees us. They're not even how we see other people.

Silly me. I thought holding up an inexpertly lettered sign with a preachy message and a hashtag was the pinnacle of human achievement.

‘Sexy bombshell’ at center of new Vatican corruption scandal

In a religion where the first woman in history is said to have caused all kinds of problems, the Roman Catholic Church should have perhaps been able to see what was coming with Francesca Chaouqui.Her hiring in 2013 to be part of COSEA, the Pope’s Commission for Reference on the Economic-Administrative Structure of the Holy See, was an eyebrow-raiser for Vatican watchers and Italian tabloids alike.She was, at 30, the youngest member on the influential eight-member panel by more than two decades. She was also the only female.

Bombshell? You guys don't get out much. She reminds me of homely girls who go to Star Wars conventions.

After Paris Attacks, C.I.A. Director Rekindles Debate Over Surveillance

WASHINGTON — In response to the Paris attacks, a top American intelligence official on Monday renewed a debate on government surveillance and privacy, denouncing “hand-wringing” over intrusive spying and saying that leaks of classified information had made it harder to identify terrorists.John O. Brennan, the director of the Central Intelligence Agency, appeared to be speaking in part about the National Security Agency’s mass surveillance of phone and Internet communications that were disclosed by Edward J. Snowden in 2013. Those disclosures prompted sharp criticism and new restrictions on electronic spying both in the United States and in Europe.

Ever hear of the Fourth Amendment? Cute little thing. It was popular around here 200 years ago. It almost seems like you have a problem using probable cause to determine who to surveil because then you'd have to admit who is probably gonna cause a problem.

Man sentenced 40 years after knocking out sister's two front teeth in row over John Lennon Christmas record

A man has been sentenced for knocking out his sister's two front teeth in a row over a Christmas record 40 years ago. Patrick and Anita Ackroyd disagreed over John Lennon's Happy Xmas (War is Over) when they were teenagers in December 1975. A court heard that he punched her in the face and knocked out her teeth in an assault that has left her wearing a dental plate ever since.

Judge: I need to know which one of them liked that dreadful song in order to rule against him or her.

Weapons stolen from an Army base in Massachusetts during a break-in just 24 hours after the Paris terrorist attacks

Weapons have been stolen from an Army base following a break-in just 24 hours after the deadly terrorist attacks in Paris. The firearms went missing from the armory at the Lincoln Army Reserve Center in Worcester, Massachusetts, on Saturday night after the suspects entered the building through the roof.

Round up the Friends of Eddie Coyle

Why Do We Still Not Know Whats Inside the Pyramids?

Recently, US presidential candidate Ben Carson commented on his theory that the pyramids were actually primarily used for storing grain, much to the consternation of the US media. Why do pyramid mysteries and alternative theories persist even now? And why have we never explored them fully?

Don't worry. ISIS will crack those open like a pinata after their next Mahdi connects the Sudan to Vienna.

Amazingly Vivid Dino Illustrations Reveal a Brutal Prehistoric World

The Paleoart of Julius Csotonyi, available on May 20, is a collection of artwork by Julius Csotonyi, an award-winning illustrator whose work lives in museums and in science papers. Csotonyi, who holds a PhD in microbiology, works frequently with paleontologists who need help bringing their fossil finds to life.

"Brutal" prehistoric world? Compared to what? My housecat will kill anything it can catch, and tortures it first, too. Your goldfish would eat you if it could fit you in its mouth.

Be careful out there in the brutal posthistoric world today.

Well, it's Monday. Your favorite team lost, so the water cooler is looking less like an oasis and more like an enemy gun emplacement. Hey, Bob, did you see Peyton Roethlesberger throw a pick six and a tantrum on fourth down with the game on the line? You know, the one that caused my team to win, and your favorite team and their benighted fans to be consigned to ignominy and defeat? What did you think about that Bob? Did you enjoy it as much as I did? Whaddya say about that, Bob?

Me, I don't mind Mondays so much. I don't root for Jameis Manziel or Cam Bradford or Russell Brees, so it's of little consequence if the Green Bay Pacers fall to the Dallas Drovers. The first day of the work week holds no terrors for me. I kind of like it there. No one makes me rake leaves at the office. I don't have to change every battery in every smoke alarm in the building at 4 AM because I can't figure out which one is beeping. It would be silly to be required to paint the outside of a skyscraper, wouldn't it? I don't even know where to look for the gutters on a 50-story building, never mind clean them out. No, the office is just fine. Besides, the Internet connection is better, and I get to read the Maggie's Farm morning links while pretending to be working, instead of pretending to be asleep on the couch when my wife gets home with groceries.

Jury convicts brothers in H-1B fraud case, jail possible

Two brothers who used H-1B workers to create a low-cost and profitable on-demand workforce were found guilty Thursday in federal court of violating the law. The trial took place in U.S. District Court in Dallas and lasted for six days. At the end, a jury convicted Atul Nanda, 46, and his brother, Jiten "Jay" Nanda, 44, each of one count of conspiracy to commit visa fraud, one count of conspiracy to harbor illegal aliens and four counts of wire fraud. The U.S. filed the indictment in 2013. Penalties range as high as $250,000 in fines and upward of 20 years in prison. A sentencing date was not set.

Silly me. From what I've observed, I would have assumed that a "fraudulent H-1B case" would involve NOT bringing illegal aliens into the country to work like coolies.

I Used to Spend $1,000 a Week on Pot Because I Thought Smoking Made My Music Better. I Was Wrong

I was a total monster. I was spending $1,000 a week on weed, and everyone I was in the band with at the time smoked as much as I did. There's so much stupid behavior caused by weed, but I always had that cliché: I needed it for creativity. I've come to realize that at the end of the day, it's only you yourself that creativity comes from. It doesn't come from weed.

Um, it's really only necessary for your audience to be stoned, not you. Sober or not, your records sound like Sesame Street on Seconal, dude.

Increased intelligence is a myth (so far)

The standard error of measuring inches or liters is usually zero assuming you have perfectly reliable, standard measurement devices. Intelligence tests generally show high test-retest reliability but they also have a standard error, and the standard error is often larger for higher scores than for lower scores. Any intelligence test score change after an intervention needs to be considered relative to the standard error of the test. Studies that use a single test to estimate intelligence before and after an intervention are using less reliable and more variable scores (bigger standard errors) than studies that combine scores from a battery of tests.

I have always found that the only way I could measurably increase other people's intelligence is by drinking heavily. The girls get better looking, too.

Lured In by Two Manhattan Psychics, to the Tune of $718,000

He was a successful and well-traveled professional, with close to seven figures in the bank, and plans for much more. And then he gave it all away, more than $718,000, in chunks at a time, to two Manhattan psychics.They vowed to reunite him with the woman he loved. Even after it was discovered that she was dead. There was the 80-mile bridge made of gold, the reincarnation portal. “I just got sucked in,” the man, Niall Rice, said in a telephone interview last week from Los Angeles. “That’s what people don’t understand. ‘How can you fall for it?’ ”

Well, those psychics certainly measurably increased that guy's intelligence. While $718k isn't exactly cheap, it still cost less than a Head Start class.

Turkey blocks access to Reddit under controversial censorship law

An official government site confirms the ban with a generic message that reads, "After technical analysis and legal consideration ... administration measure has been taken for this website." The note is dated November 13th. According to the statement, Reddit was taken down under Turkey's controversial internet censorship law, known as Internet Law No. 5651. Under the law, Turkish Supreme Council for Telecommunications and IT (TIB) can ban websites and block internet content for a handful of reasons, including anything involved with pornography, prostitution, drugs, terrorism, illegal file sharing, sexual abuse of children, and "crimes against" Mustafa Atatürk, the first president of Turkey.

I've blocked Reddit from my computer under an uncontroversial lack of interest in the opinions of neckbeards law.

'Made in France' release postponed following attacks in Paris

"Made in France," directed by Nicolas Boukhrief, stars Malik Zidi as the journalist who uses his own Muslim background to infiltrate a mosque in the suburbs of Paris. He eventually hooks up with a group of would-be terrorists planning to "sow chaos in the heart of Paris," according to a synopsis on the French movie website Allociné.

The Paris gig has been cancelled. I wouldn't worry about it, though; it's not a big Cinema Verite town.

There’s a Downton Abbey Thief on the Loose in America

A local NBC affiliate reports that 30-year-old Branden Joseph Deel began his Downton Abbey–disc binge in January 2014, “when he stole 12 DVD box sets worth a total retail value of $560.88 and has continued to target retailers since then.” As Downton Abbey fans ourselves, we can‘t help but hypothesize that “the Downton Abbey addict” was so enraged by a story line early in the period drama’s fourth season—that Lady Mary would dare to entertain a flirtation so soon after the tragic death of her one true love, Matthew—that, in an act of misguided revenge, he tried to wipe out local retailers’ Downton stocks and possibly save fellow fans from future devastation.

Occam's Razor: he needs coasters and finally ran out of AOL discs.

What Is A Digital-To-Analog Converter, And Do You Need One?

And as more and more of what we listen to comes from our hard drives and cloud services, we’re less dependent on the medium itself and more dependent on the technology that turns data to drum beats. But the audio company, Schiit, which started back in 2010, argues that the best way to maximize the sound that comes into your headphones is to connect the headphones via USB to an external digital-to-analog converter (DAC). The idea is that, whether you have lossless, uncompressed files (which, unlike stripped down MP3s, hold more information and more accurately represent the original sound), iTunes, or a streaming service like Spotify, you’re not getting the full potential without a middleman.

First sentence begins with "And." Second sentence begins with "But." The author then uses parentheses to enclose a dependent clause instead of commas. The rest is all stupid, useless Schiit. So the answer to the second question is 01101110 01101111! Whoops, forgot to convert it to analog. NO!

Adblock Plus was in NYC last week waving the olive branch at advertisers

As the largest developer of ad blockers, Eyeo, with its popular Adblock Plus, has found itself at the center of a fierce debate about ethics and, potentially, the legality of blocking mobile browser ads. The subject has been a popular one in Europe for some time, but it caught fire in the U.S. in June when Apple announced that its iOS 9 mobile operating system would enable (and some say welcome) mobile ad-blocker apps on iPhones. (A new Adblock Plus iOS app for iOS 9 was approved by Apple in September.)

Adblock won't ever stop things like that Popular Science "article" about a particular brand of audio converter. Me, I just want a parentheses blocker.

Microsoft opens Sydney store, its first flagship outside North America

The Redmond-based tech giant has been eager to build buzz around the launch of its first standalone Asia Pacific location and second flagship, after the two-storey Microsoft store in Manhattan. Customers queued in the bright sun with the the promise of free concert tickets and lucky door prizes for early birds, before the window coverings dropped to reveal store staff dancing and cheering inside.

I wonder. Is it no longer possible for a tech company to survive in the market without pretending the entire business is a Gymboree?

That should be enough information to tide you over until lunch. If you fib and say you have a doctor's appointment right after, you might make it until 3:30 before you're required to do any actual work. Make sure to leave early, too.  As they say on the Department of Public Works crew, "No sense killing the job."

Hello everyone. I trust you're all done sleeping one off. 

Whoops, I meant to say, I trust you're all back from Sunday service now. If you're like me, there's nothing like a hot cup of joe and the Sunday paper spread out in front of you after church. Of course a printed newspaper was last spotted in my home back when Reagan was abroad in the land, and when the Pope wasn't pro-choice, so I have to make do with a passel of pixels spread out in front of me. On the plus side, the poorly cropped pictures are more plentiful, and some of the articles actually start talking to you, which give the voices in my head a day off. On to the news!

Phones need 'bed mode' to protect sleep

Smartphones, tablets and e-readers should have an automatic "bedtime mode" that stops them disrupting people's sleep, says a leading doctor. Prof Paul Gringras argued the setting should filter out the blue light that delays the body clock and keeps people awake later into the evening. The doctor, from Evelina Children's Hospital in London, said every new model was "bluer and brighter". He said manufacturers needed to show more "responsibility".

Or, you know, you could shut the stupid thing off, and make your kids shut it off. You know, like an adult.

How to Make a Star Wars TIE Fighter Using Starbucks Cups

A few years ago, WIRED’s chief photographer was standing in line at Starbucks when inspiration struck forcefully. “The ribbing on the drink holders reminded me of solar panels,” Winters says. “That instantly registered ‘TIE fighter’ in my head.” That sent him on a quest to create a Yoda-sized TIE fighter using only stuff from Starbucks. All told he needed one tall lid, 10 96-ounce coffee boxes, 12 sample cups, 37 grande cups, 63 drink holders, 216 stirrers, and a workspace significantly larger than a coffee-shop table.

Alternate title: How to Make an Infantile Adult Using Only Pop Culture and a Candy Store Masquerading as a Coffee Shop.

The bizarre scheme to transform a remote island into the new Dubai

Earlier that year, the Comorian government had received a proposal from some visiting Arab businessmen. What if the Comoros started to sell their citizenship to raise funds? There was a great demand for passports in the Middle East, the men explained; for starters, wealthy individuals saw a second or third nationality as a shortcut to make travelling and doing business abroad easier.

I think France has also been toying with the idea of hosting some "visiting Arab businessmen." I wonder how that's going?

Justice officials fear nation's biggest wiretap operation may not be legal

RIVERSIDE, Calif. — Federal drug agents have built a massive wiretapping operation in the Los Angeles suburbs, secretly intercepting tens of thousands of Americans' phone calls and text messages to monitor drug traffickers across the United States despite objections from Justice Department lawyers who fear the practice may not be legal.

I have a dictionary. I fear that "Fear" is the wrong word in that headline. DILLIGAF might approximate their mood. however.

How Paris ISIS Terrorists May Have Used PlayStation 4 To Discuss And Plan Attacks

The hunt for those responsible (eight terrorists were killed Saturday night, but accomplices may still be at large) led to a number of raids in nearby Brussels. Evidence reportedly turned up included at least one PlayStation 4 console. Belgian federal home affairs minister Jan Jambon said outright that the PS4 is by used ISIS agents to communicate, and was selected due to the fact that it’s notoriously hard to monitor.

"The hunt for those responsible." That's a good one. I imagine common-sense Playstation control will fix everything. With an outright ban on assault Playstations, of course.

The Savings App Designed by a Behavioral Economist

As humans, our failings are epic. Some of us eat too much, lie to ourselves, don’t exercise enough, and spend so much money that we have nothing left for that vacation in Hawaii. But technology, Dan Ariely believes, might save us from ourselves. Ariely, a professor of psychology and behavioral economics at Duke University, is an investor and the chief behavioral economist at Qapital, a Swedish-startup geared toward encouraging Millennials to save.

Or, you know, you could shut the stupid thing off, and make your kids shut it off. You know, like an adult.

Why human-in-the-loop computing is the future of machine learning

First, a machine learning model takes a first pass on the data, or every video, image or document that needs labeling. That model also assigns a confidence score, or how sure the algorithm is that it’s making the right judgment. If the confidence score is below a certain value, it sends the data to a human annotator to make a judgment.

I know! We could install a steering wheel in self-driving cars! That would let the passenger drive the car using their judgment! Of course, first they'd have to shut their stupid iPhone off, and make their kids shut theirs off. You know, like an adult.

Six Strange Things That Have Been Happening in Financial Markets

While the term may mean little to your average retail investor, swap spreads have become the talk of financial markets in recent weeks as they plumb historic lows and seemingly defy market logic. At issue is the fact that swap rates—or rates charged for interest rate swaps—have dipped below yields on equivalent U.S. Treasuries, indicating that investors are charging less to deal with banks and corporations than with the U.S. government. Such a thing should never happen, as U.S. Treasuries theoretically represent the "risk-free" rate while swap rates are imbued with significant counterparty risk that should demand a premium.

Let's see: Barack Barry Hussein Soetoro Obama. I only count five.

Why Free Can Be a Problem on the Internet

T-Mobile, the wireless company, said last week that it would let customers watch as many movies as they wanted on services like Netflix and HBO as well as all other kinds of video, without having it count against their monthly data plans. Given the growing popularity of streaming video, its plan, called Binge On, should appeal to many consumers. But there are real concerns about whether such promotions could give telecommunications companies the ability to influence what services people use on the Internet, benefiting some businesses and hurting others.

Or, you know, you could shut the stupid thing off, and make your kids shut it off. You know, like an adult.

In Scandinavia, “patient hotels” provide an alternative to hospitals

On August 21, a new hotel opened on the campus of Denmark’s foremost specialized care hospital, Rigshospitalet. Called the Patient Hotel, this 74-room building provides convenient accommodations for self-sufficient patients who have traveled from far away, for an exam or treatment. For patients undergoing long-tern medical care, the tranquil, sky-lit space also provides a temporary escape from the regular hospital’s blaring machines and daily bustle.

Wow. Those benevolent and intelligent Scandinavians have discovered that neurotic hypochondriacal lonely people prefer a four-star hotel over staying at home and reading Web MD -- if someone else pays for it. There's also a helpful picuture of of a member of this super-race of humans bicycling on two underinflated tires while texting. 

Well, that's all the news that fits. Into my schedule, I mean. I think I'm going to, I don't know, shut this stupid thing off now.  You, know, like an adult.

I don't get in nearly as many scrapes on Saturday Night as I once did. I'm always the toughest guy at the Olive Garden at 4:10, so no one dares front me over the newly rationed bread sticks, and I'm usually home in bed before the real heavy stuff comes down past 5:00.

I'm no shrinking violet, though. I was a welterweight pacifist back in the day. Since I didn't believe in violence, I was only allowed to fight with other pacifists in my weight class. I once gave an Indian burn to a Hare Krishna in an airport terminal that I bet he's hasn't forgotten yet.

Anyway, if you venture out this evening with a glint in your eye and the devil in your heart, be careful of hanging around known tough guys like Elton John. Did you ever listen to the lyrics of Saturday Night's All Right (for Fighting)? That dude would kick your ass with his crepe-soled sneakers at the drop of a straw boater.

Here are the Saturday Morning Links:

The world is entering a third stage of a rolling debt crisis, this time centred on emerging markets

Householders in America have struggled for years to work off the excess borrowing taken on during a global housing boom in the 2000s. The economy has suffered from a shortfall of spending as a consequence. The world economy was dealt a second blow, after 2010, when the delayed effects of that earlier boom were played out in a debt crisis at the fringes of the euro area, one that at several points threatened to break up the currency union.

Housing debt? Ten years roll by and somehow everything is still George Bush's fault.

Stop-and-Seize Turns Police Into Self-Funding Gangs

The threat to individual liberty from stop-and-seize is painfully clear. Without requirements for an arrest or for a warrant, the power to confiscate cash is a clear diminution of property rights. Effectively, the police have been given official sanction to commit literal highway robbery without the threat of punishment. People whose property was seized must pay a lot of money and spend a long time in court for even the chance of getting it back, and police who seize money with no good reason don't, apparently, suffer any threat of discipline.

I have solved this problem with insolvency.

Vincent Asaro, Accused in Lufthansa Heist, Is Found Not Guilty

The verdicts, delivered after little more than two days of deliberations, left many in the courtroom stunned, most visibly prosecutors from the United States attorney’s office, which had spent years building a case against Mr. Asaro, 80, with testimony from high-ranking Mafia figures and recordings by an informer for the Federal Bureau of Investigation.

People are stunned that jurors don't want a purported mafia member angry at them. That is stunning.

Paris attacks: Bataclan and other assaults leave many dead

France has declared a national state of emergency and tightened borders after at least 128 people were killed in a night of gun and bomb attacks in Paris. Eighty people were reported killed after gunmen burst into the Bataclan concert hall and took hostages before security forces stormed the hall.People were shot dead at restaurants and bars at five other sites in Paris. At least 180 people were injured. These are the deadliest attacks in Europe since the 2004 Madrid bombings.

Hmm. It would appear they don't - want - to live like a refugee. Don't want to live like a ref-huge-gee.

Apple is Shutting Down Beats Music, Just Like Most Companies it Buys

Apple bought Beats last year for $3 billion in large part for the technology behind its streaming-music service. Unlike so many recent acquisitions, Apple let Beats Music live on instead of its more typical strategy of immediately shutting down acquisitions after incorporating their technology into its own products.

William Howard Taft wouldn't leave a scrap of flesh on Tim Cook's bones.

Microsoft Invented Google Earth in the 90s Then Totally Blew It

Terraserver could have, should have been a product that ensured Microsoft would remain the world’s most important internet company well into the 21st century. It was the first-ever publicly available interactive satellite map of the world. The world’s first-ever terabyte-sized database. In fact, it was the world’s largest database for several years, and that Compaq was—physically speaking—the world's largest computer. Terraserver was a functional and popular Google Earth predecessor that launched and worked well before Google even thought of the concept.

Oh look. The same people who said Microsoft was an evil monopoly because they made an operating system and a web browser are mocking them for not taking over the whole Internet.

MIT team invents efficient shockwave-based process for desalination of water.

...the system uses an electrically driven shockwave within a stream of flowing water, which pushes salty water to one side of the flow and fresh water to the other, allowing easy separation of the two streams. The new approach is described in the journal Environmental Science and Technology Letters, in a paper by professor of chemical engineering and mathematics Martin Bazant, graduate student Sven Schlumpberger, undergraduate Nancy Lu, and former postdoc Matthew Suss.

Somehow I don't think Mizzou students would have come up with this.

Can the vocabulary of deceit reveal fraudulent studies?

The deceitful papers tend to be vaguer, more difficult to read, and have fewer quantifying words, the authors found. They also use a bit more jargon, with fraudulent publications containing 1.5% more technical terms. Another trend, Markowitz told ScienceInsider, is that spurious papers generally had more references. Such characteristics tend to make fraudulent papers more “convoluted” and “costly” in terms of readers’ time, he says.

I just look for the word "consensus." Saves time.

Beware of ads that use inaudible sound to link your phone, TV, tablet, and PC

The ultrasonic pitches are embedded into TV commercials or are played when a user encounters an ad displayed in a computer browser. While the sound can't be heard by the human ear, nearby tablets and smartphones can detect it. When they do, browser cookies can now pair a single user to multiple devices and keep track of what TV commercials the person sees, how long the person watches the ads, and whether the person acts on the ads by doing a Web search or buying a product.

I only watch football on TV so I imagine the continuous stream of high-pitched swearing will interfere with this scheme.

Have a lovely Saturday!

Well, if you manage to crawl to the finish line at 5 PM today, you've made it through another week. Look on the bright side. Unless you're melanin-challenged and work at a college, you'll still have a job on Monday, and you have two whole days to show your liver who's boss. On to today's links!

Did You Just Get a $500 Freelance Assignment? The City Might Bill You $30,000

Although little-known to people who work at home sewing, writing, designing, illustrating, party planning or tutoring, their perfectly legal pursuits are deemed "unlicensed" by L.A. officials, and they must register with City Hall. Then, these tens of thousands of residents are notified to pay an obscure annual city "business tax."

Just drive an Uber cab. Your magic iPhone transubstantiates all regulations into ponies and cupcakes.

60-Year-Old French Apartments Look Like a Utopian Dream

Between 1954 and 1973, the country erected public housing in the suburbs surrounding the City of Light. These towering structures, which included some six million units, embodied the prevailing idea that modernist architecture could help foster a utopian state by improving people’s lives. “They were praised as places where men could blossom away from the agitation of big cities,” Kronental says.

My Utopian dream is living in France after all these buildings are demolished.

The Making of the Most Expensive Mansion in History

When the house's asking price was announced last May, some people figured it was an absurd marketing ploy, since if the property fetches anything close to $500 million, it will obliterate the current world-record price of $221 million, for a London penthouse. But absurdity is all relative in today's gigamansion market—particularly in L.A., where previous milestones such as the $85 million sale of the 123-room Spelling manor in 2011 are beginning to look quaint.

The author of this article sure doesn't know much history. Try putting in an offer on the Biltmore Estate. You'll have to buy 1/6th of the Pisgah National Forest to go along with it. It used to be the back yard.

Sweden Reintroduces Border Controls

"The overall assessment when we collect information from the police, the Civil Contingencies Agency and the Migration Agency is that it is warranted to impose temporary border controls," interior minister Anders Ygeman told a press conference. More than 120,000 people have arrived since January in Sweden, which is, with Germany, one the favoured destinations for migrants coming to Europe and wich has, until recently, upheld what Ygeman called a "generous" policy.

At this point, wouldn't Swedish border controls only keep Muslims in?

Udacity Raises $105 Million Series D, Bringing Valuation To $1 Billion

The announcement came as the company celebrated the one-year anniversary of its nanodegree program. The nanodegrees are now recognized by some of Silicon Valley’s biggest companies, including Google and Salesforce.

I guess homeschooling is only bad when conservatives do it.

The Latest Evidence That Helmet Laws Don't Help Bike Safety

What the researchers failed to find was any connection between helmet laws and bike-related hospitalization rates. That held true whether they looked at all cycling injuries or just traffic-specific injuries. Surprisingly, it also held true when they narrowed in on body parts protected by a helmet: the brain, head, scalp, skull, face, even neck. Since helmet laws don’t necessarily mean compliance, they looked at helmet usage, too, and once again found nothing.

Humans take chances. Increase their feeling of security, and they'll take bigger chances.

7 Long-Term Productivity Habits Of The Most Successful People

One thing uniting the most high-power leaders with the lowest-level workers is time: Day in and day out, we all have the same amount of it. Where the variation comes in is how we use it. Some of the most successful people tend to attribute their achievements at least partly to time management.

The most successful people don't spend all day reading lists on the Internet.

Van Gogh's Turbulent Mind Captured Turbulence

The painter's magnificent brushwork made (intuitive?) use of a property known as luminance, a measure of the relative brightness between different points. The eye is more sensitive to luminance change than to color change, meaning we respond more promptly to changes in brightness than in colors. This is what gives many Impressionist paintings that familiar and emotionally moving twinkle, as we can see, for example, in Claude Monet's Impression, Sunrise.

Hey, NPR: His brain didn't work. His eyes were fine.

The New Yorker Editor Who Became a Comic Book Hero

Comic books? Educational? The very idea is comical to anyone familiar with the 1954 Senate subcommittee investigation that linked juvenile delinquency to horror and crime comics. The politicians dealt the industry a staggering blow that it overcame only after superheroes, plus corny teens like Archie and a rascal named Dennis, came to the rescue. Still, comics are seldom associated with literacy. But Françoise Mouly started Toon Books precisely to get more young people reading, and thinking, and enjoying the printed word, lushly illustrated and handsomely bound as well.

So, my collection of Classics Illustrated never happened, right Francoise?

How the Western Diet Has Derailed Our Evolution

A group of Italian microbiologists had compared the intestinal microbes of young villagers in Burkina Faso with those of children in Florence, Italy. The villagers, who subsisted on a diet of mostly millet and sorghum, harbored far more microbial diversity than the Florentines, who ate a variant of the refined, Western diet. Where the Florentine microbial community was adapted to protein, fats, and simple sugars, the Burkina Faso microbiome was oriented toward degrading the complex plant carbohydrates we call fiber.

Florence, Italy, gave us the Renaissance. I'm pretty sure you can buy manganese mined by hand in Burkina Faso, which is pretty swell, too.

Everybody have a great day, and make sure to buy a drink for your whole microbial community tonight after work. It's the friendly thing to do.

I was wondering. Does anybody know how to write jokes any longer? Or more to the point, write humorously? If they're extant, I haven't noticed it. It takes a light touch to write humor, and few seem interested in giving it a try. The best writers would only salt in jokes as foils to a larger humorous situation. Wodehouse had Bertie Wooster, who was impersonating Gussie Fink-Nottle, trying to tell an inappropriate joke at dinner, which is being hosted by a gaggle of grim old sisters, some of whom are hard of hearing.

- There are these three deaf chaps on a train and it stops at Wembley.
- What's he doing?
- Mr Fink-Nottle is telling an anecdote.
- Anyway, there it is at Wembley, and one chap says, "ls this Wembley?, and the other says, "No, it's Thursday."
- What did he say?
- He said, "No, it's Thursday."
- No, it's not. lt's Friday.
- l know.
- l changed my library book.
- lt's a joke, Charlotte.
- Thank you.
- The third one says, "So am l. Let's go and have a drink."
- lt's a joke about drink, Charlotte.
- No, it's not about drink.
- lt's about Why did the first man bring up the days of the week?
- No, the first man is the one who says, "ls this Wimbledon?''
- No - That was the second man.
- Let Mr Fink-Nottle finish his joke before we judge it.
- Well, that was it, actually.

In the book this is adapted from, the text is funny because it is a comic situation described in an amusing way. The joke is an excuse to be humorous. It's supposed to be a bad joke, but it really isn't. Twain used the same sort of approach to tell good jokes, but by prefacing them by saying, "This is a bad joke," he had an easier time weaving a humorous narrative around them. The woefully misnamed "situation comedies" have become the modern version of this form of light comedy, but they are usually just a series of blunt jokes barely strung together. Not the same thing.

At any rate, is this Wembley? Time for the links, all supplied with PG Wodehouse quotes to suit:

10 Famous Korean War Veterans

The Korean War began in the early morning hours of June 25, 1950, when North Korean soldiers stormed across the 38th parallel in a coordinated attack against South Korea. The first military action of the Cold War lasted three years and claimed the lives of 5 million soldiers and civilians. On the 65th anniversary of the start of the Korean War, learn about 10 notables—from astronauts to actors—who served in the conflict.

“...it has been well said that it is precisely these moments when we are feeling that ours is the world and everything that's in it that Fate selects for sneaking up on us with the rock in the stocking.”

Alibaba's Singles' Day sales surge 60 percent to $14.3 billion

Singles' Day was originally a mock celebration in China for people not in relationships. But Alibaba in 2009 co-opted the event into a consumption-fest for all, featuring steep discounts and other promotions aimed at attracting droves of customers online.

"You can't be a successful dictator and design women's underwear. One or the other. Not both."

The Amazing Rube Slowberg Machine

Exactly how slow will it be? Will I be alive by the time it finishes? Will any of my grandchildren live to see how it actually ends? Will the inevitable heat-death of the universe interfere with the Rube Slowberg machine, or is that part of it?

“In a series of events, all of which had been a bit thick, this, in his opinion, achieved the maximum of thickness.”

The Case for Buying a Home You Can't Afford

Young professionals willing to stretch their budgets now should consider Boston, Seattle, and Washington, D.C., among other cities, according to a new report from Trulia. In New Haven, Conn., the typical millennial (defined by Trulia as an adult between ages 25 and 34) can expect to spend 37 percent of her income on housing in the first year of her mortgage. Three years later, though, the same homebuyer’s monthly payments will fall below 31 percent of her income, according to Trulia’s estimates.

“Beggars approached the task of trying to persuade perfect strangers to bear the burden of their maintenance with that optimistic vim which makes all the difference. It was one of those happy mornings.”

Court Says Tracking Web Histories Can Violate Wiretap Act

But despite those decisions and perhaps more importantly, the court was careful to make another point: That merely tracking the URLs someone visits can constitute collecting the contents of their communications, and that doing so without a warrant can violate the Wiretap Act. And that’s an opinion that will apply not just to Google, but to the Justice
Department.

“I mean, imagine how some unfortunate Master Criminal would feel, on coming down to do a murder at the old Grange, if he found that not only was Sherlock Holmes putting in the weekend there, but Hercule Poirot, as well."

Rare early photographs of Peking

Photographs of Peking, now known as Beijing, made by Thomas Child in the 1870s and 1880s are to go on show in London's Chinatown as part of Asian Art in London season. More than 30 original photographs from the Stephan Loewentheil Historical Photography of China Collection, the largest holding of historical photographs of China in private hands, are included in the show.

"Memories are like mulligatawny soup in a cheap restaurant. It is best not to stir them."

Why I Chose The Gun And Then Silicon Valley

When I look around, I see people who want to make a contribution. I see people who want to make a better world, by doing groundbreaking scientific work, by creating impressive works of art, by writing critical articles or inspiring books, by starting up sustainable businesses. And you all have chosen your own instruments to fulfill this mission of creating a better world. Some chose the microscope as their instrument. Others chose dancing or painting or making music like we just heard. Some chose the pen. Others work through the instrument of money.  Ladies and gentlemen, I made a different choice….I chose the gun.

“The fascination of shooting as a sport depends almost wholly on whether you are at the right or wrong end of the gun.”

Facebook director sells nearly half his stake

Facebook Inc. director Marc Andreessen has sold nearly half his stake in the social network since Oct. 30, securities filings show.Between Oct. 30 and Nov. 6, Andreessen sold 921,362 shares in Facebook collecting about $96.5 million, according to three filings with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission.

“As a rule, from what I've observed, the American captain of industry doesn't do anything out of business hours. When he has put the cat out and locked up the office for the night, he just relapses into a state of coma from which he emerges only to start being a captain of industry again.” 

How Could You Like That Book?

In fact it may be that the most seductive novelists are also the ones most willing to risk irritating you. Faulkner comes to mind, so often on the edge between brilliant and garrulous. Italy’s Carlo Emilio Gadda was another. Muriel Spark. Sometimes even Kafka. Resistance to these writers is never a surprise to me. On the other hand, I do spend endless hours mulling over the mystery of what others like. Again and again the question arises: How can they?

“It was one of the dullest speeches I ever heard. The Agee woman told us for three quarters of an hour how she came to write her beastly book, when a simple apology was all that was required.”

Have a lovely practice Friday.

Well, Bird Dog has gone off for a few days to make sure his mountain redoubt/bolthole is still stocked with beans and ammo. That means you're stuck with me, Roger, the King of Sicily.

Not to worry. I'm not prone to strong opinions, so there's no need to offer trigger warnings for the faint of heart and pushy college students. The only trigger warning I ever paid attention to was a shell being racked. All the rest is conversation, and a dull one at that. On to this morning's links!

Sexual Selection Makes Female Songbirds Drab

The study, published in Nature, found that sexual selection does play an important role in creating colour differences between male and female plumage. But the contrast is largely driven by females evolving to become drab.

Life, ah,finds a way. I bought plenty of drinks for some pretty drab females back in the day.

Ancillary Copyright 2.0: The European Commission is preparing a frontal attack on the hyperlink

According to a draft communication on copyright reform leaked yesterday (via IPKat), the Commission is considering putting the simple act of linking to content under copyright protection. This idea flies in the face of both existing interpretation and spirit of the law as well as common sense. Each weblink would become a legal landmine and would allow press publishers to hold every single actor on the Internet liable.

Oh dear. Bloggers would have to produce their own text and stop linking to newspapers they purport to hate.

After 'robust' discussion, fast food giant McDonald's is not pursuing a REIT

Amid low interest rates, McDonald's also plans to add a "meaningful" amount of additional debt, said CFO Kevin Ozan in a release."As a result, we are increasing the Company's cash return to shareholders target to about $30 billion for the three-year period ending 2016 - a $10 billion increase over our previous target, with incremental debt funding the vast majority of the increase," he said.

There's a term for borrowing money to pay existing investors instead of trying to turn a profit.

Mummified Hand from Yorkshire May Be Last Hand of Glory Still in Existence

The Bladen Journal reports that a mummified hand found in Castleton, North Yorkshire, England is the only known ‘Hand of Glory’, a grotesque artifact meant to aid thieves in their work during the night, still in existence. This mummified hand supposedly has the power to “entrance humans” according to the Express. Hands of Glory were also a favorite tool for thieves and creative storytellers for over 200 years.

Bob Dylan and the “Hot Hand”

But as Dylan grew older, as the immense catalogue of his songs came to embrace everything—folk, rock, gospel, blues, Tin Pan Alley—he looked back on the golden period of 1965-66, the moment of the hot hand, when the songs came two and three a day, as if from heaven, and he seemed as filled with wonder as the rest of us.

Do I contradict myself? Very well, then I contradict myself, I am large, I contain multitudes.

Helmut Schmidt dies at 96; W. German chancellor fought domestic terror

Schmidt, a center-left Social Democrat, led West Germany from 1974 to 1982. He was elected chancellor by lawmakers in May 1974 after the resignation of fellow Social Democrat Willy Brandt, triggered when a top aide to Brandt was unmasked as an East German agent. The new leader brought a sometimes abrasive self-confidence and his experience as West Germany's defense, finance and economy ministers to the job, which he took during the economic downturn that followed the 1973 oil crisis.

Better than what they have now. Neither could carry Adenauer's jockstrap, however.

Life in a Studio Apartment with my Wife and Two Sons

Between July 2011 and August 2015 I lived in a ~400sqft studio apartment in San Francisco. I moved in a bachelor but by the time I moved out, I was one member of a four person family. Here are some things I learned along the way.

Six of us lived in a 960 square foot ranch, and were about average. Why do Millennials demand a trophy for everything? Move.

‘Tinder for threesomes’ gets $500K investment

There are no two ways about it: This dating app was built for threesomes.London-based startup 3nder — the name can be pronounced “Thrinder” to rhyme with “Tinder,” according to its founder — said it has raised $500,000 in seed capital from a pair of unnamed angel investors.Since 3nder’s mid-2014 launch, nearly 1 million users have downloaded the iOS app in search of kinky hookups — whether “straight, bisexual, gay, poly- or pansexual,” says founder and CEO Dimo Trifonov.

I'll bet both investors are divorce lawyers

Are the organic hand-picked tomatoes sold at farmers’ markets really better, in a technical sense, or do they just make us feel like better consumers – perhaps even better human beings? If the organic tomato is just a vehicle for romantic fallacy, then we have to look dispassionately at how they are grown from the perspective of sustainability.

I see the generation that thinks they invented small apartments thinks they invented agriculture the week before.

Well, everybody sally forth and make sure you make enough money today to buy sustainably grown tomatoes before the farm goes out of business and you're forced to buy the pinkish baseballs they always had at the A&P.