Grift. It’s all scam, all the time.

It’s funny, this kinda stuff reminds me of the best parts of the (largely bygone) punk rock and hacker subcultures. Feels like almost the specific overlap between the two. And lately it feels like there’s been more and more of that, like the condition of the world is causing those ethos to reawaken, to recapitulate their evergreen salience, maybe even to combine.

Probably projecting a bit, to be fair. I feel I’ve internally stayed an old punk rocker and hacker, and feel those old flames reigniting, despite the indignities and compromises that come with middle age and spending eventual adulthood trying to survive in corporate America. Not so punk after all, lmao

Edit: minor grammar

Yep, this is what’s going on. As is usual with Trump, there’s no actual ideology or goal, it’s all scam all the time. When you can unilaterally announce at any moment of any day that you are about to grenade the global economy, that’s going to have a guaranteed response from the markets. Predictable as the fuckin sunrise. Especially because everyone rightly knows Trump truly doesn’t give a shit about the consequences and absolutely might just do it.

Then he says some wildly different shit a different day, with again 100% predictable market movements (even announcing on Truth Social ahead of time to buy, which is truly beyond the pale), and everyone he knows gets even richer, again. That grift will wear out and stop working and he’ll switch to something else.

And again, and again, and again. All scam, all the time. I mean, plebes like us are aware of multiple concurrent grifts the guy is using the presidency for. Imagine what we don’t know about! It’s kleptocracy of the highest order.

Dang, I know how that goes. Makes for a good dish for folks like us in that case, lot of it keeps for quite a while lol

That is a LOT of stuff hahaha I wanna try it!

That does make it tasty, I can stand to do a bit more of that too. Here’s my decadent unconventional (but extremely easy) sandwich topper - crunch-less, sadly, but could probably be improved with some cheese crustin.

I like to melt some butter with red miso, about 50/50 or so? You’ll know the consistency after messing around a bit. Red miso is super dense flavor wise of course and also doesn’t mix easily, so yeah. Today I put it thinly on half a bagel, cream cheese on the other half, toasted, random stuff in between. You can add brown sugar to make it sweeter, or any kind of spice, also both lol.

Disappointing you, myself, and so, so many taste buds

Oof, I’ve never put nearly that much flavorful stuff into tuna for a sandwich, this sounds amazing. What have I been doing?!

Hmm, I don’t remember much, and not in his books in general. Although I am the kind of reader that’s wholly uninterested (no shade to those who feel differently!) - but it’s entirely possible it’s there and my brain doesn’t really hold onto it! But put bluntly his stories are usually bleak, romance would fit a little oddly.

You say complacent, I say complicit.

Awesome!! And I don’t think it was a series when I read it, so been a while for me too lol. And yeah, Revelation Space books are just so, so good. Can’t say enough good things about the worlds this guy builds. Artifact in the meme would fit right in, lol

This post really doesn’t call for this comment but here we go -

One of my favorite authors wrote at least one book in a setting where many galactic civilizations have come and largely gone, and treasure hunters try to “crack baubles” - break into old vaults and such left behind. Think Space Indiana Jones! But what’s really compelling and brain melty to me is that these civilizations used entirely unknown tech and physics in some cases. So they’re trying to break into and steal things they cannot possibly even comprehend, which is SO foolish and so fucking cool, and if that were available to me, my curiosity would utterly demand I keep at it until dead or worse.

Book is Revenger by Alastair Reynolds. Plus it’s got one of the scariest fuckin pirates ever, so I mean, Space Indiana Jones with horrifying unknown tech treasure and implacable, immortal(?) pirate villains…that’s gonna be a strong recommendation for the right flavor of reader lmao.

For real, what a braindead (at best) thing to say. His attempts to ethnically cleanse Palestine and build resorts on the coast, and his attempts to steal mineral wealth from Ukraine while under brutal attack by Russia, those attempts have faltered? Yeah, thankfully they have, I’m sure he’s still trying though.

I’m so tired of all the “reasonable language” used for this administration. It just amounts to flat out lying to avoid upsetting the very worst fucking people. Again - at best - that’s me being charitable, there are even worse motivations than that of course.

Playing Binding of Isaac finally. I was a little disappointed with the difficulty honestly! One of my most heavily played games ever is another Roguelike - DCSS. To be clear that one is turn-based, which is very different, but it took me years and dozens at least, probably low hundreds of runs to beat it.

I’m sure I’ll be quickly humbled by the hard-mode difficulty and challenges and such on this one though. Super rewarding, fun, and extremely replayable! Great game. The different characters can play really differently, and through RNG you can def end up with some hilariously weak, or strong, builds.

Can’t say I agree. $20 million plus in person visits = significant shits given.

What’s making you say that? I so badly want this to be true.