But since it's Thanksgiving, we should eat a traditional Thanksgiving meal on a pizza crust, which Krave It helpfully provides. The Thanksgiving pizza has turkey, sweet potatoes with roasted marshmallows, cranberry sauce, stuffing, and gravy. There's a complete meal in every slice.
Once upon a time, one requirement for an FCC broadcast license was a certain amount of airtime dedicated to serving the public. TV networks fulfilled this requirement by bringing us the news, 15 minutes of it, at 6 PM. When that was expanded to 30 minutes in September of 1963, all the ad slots were sold immediately. But the networks maintained that TV news was a loss, as it was expensive to run a journalism department that did nothing else. Then on November 22, 1963, 60 years ago today, President John F.Kennedy was assassinated in Dallas.
All the networks ran coverage of the assassination, the aftermath, and the funeral non-stop for days, with no ad breaks. That cost the networks millions of dollars in lost ad revenue, but it garnered them the goodwill of the public, and even more important, got everyone to tune into the nightly news and other news shows that were gradually added. TV networks still let us think that the news was a public service and a financial loss for years afterward, even as each new news show became more profitable. Read how the business of news broadcasting was a moneymaker long before we knew at the Conversation. -via Damn Interesting
If the Disney+ series Kenobi had been produced in the 1980s, it would have been on network TV and be squeezed between The Incredible Hulk and MacGyver. Ewan McGregor (born in 1971) would have been too young for the role, but Sir Alec Guinness was still around in the 1980s. Considering how he felt about Star Wars, they would have had a hard time getting him for the role. Oh yeah, in case you haven't seen Kenobi, this video contains spoilers. I haven't seen it either, but when you live on the internet, spoilers just come with the territory.
What really makes this retro TV intro perfect is the original theme song, called "Be the One" by Auralnauts, with guitar and vocals by Scott Beetley. The feedback to the TV intro made that clear, so Auralnauts went ahead and made a full music video for the song, by mixing in video clips from the very 1980s music video for "The Unforgiven" by Robert Tepper.
Considering the audio and video are from completely different musicians, this is a masterpiece of editing. But that's what you would expect from Auralnauts.
How did this happen? Redditor hbmomo's mother was making a pie for Thanksgiving when the law of gravity took a temporary break and the stand mixer saw its opportunity for escape. It didn't make a clean getaway (see the counter), but the incident resulted in a priceless photograph. If you think hard enough, you can figure it out, but I'll go ahead and explain. The windows have blinds, and since they were pulled up, the cord was pretty long, and got caught in the beaters. It became an instant pulley! The wonder is that the blinds were attached strongly enough that it pulled the heavy mixer up instead of pulling the blinds off the window. But there are other Thanksgiving disasters that also cry out for explanation.
Last year, a friend of redditor alwaysangrythrowaway cooked this turkey. Was it marinated in Pepto-Bismol? Benadryl, maybe? Or is it just a food coloring prank? The poster said it had been rubbed in "neon pink salt" which others decided must have been pink curing salt, or Prague Powder. It contains sodium nitrate and is not safe to be eaten in this concentration. But we also learned that the friend burnt that turkey badly and it was not eaten.
Tomorrow will be Thanksgiving Day in the US. It has been celebrated for the past 400 years, but it wasn't always on the fourth Thursday of November. Sources say that it started in 1621 though that isn't confirmed. Also, Farmer's Almanac says it was celebrated on November 25th from 1668, but then it changed after that.
When George Washington became president, Congress requested that he declare November 26, 1789 to be Thanksgiving Day. But since then, other presidents have also moved the date around several times. During Abraham Lincoln's presidency, the last Thursday of November became the regular annual day that Thanksgiving was celebrated. However, things would change again in 1939.
Since the last Thursday of November was too close to December, former President Franklin D. Roosevelt decided to move it to the second-to-last Thursday so that people would have an allowance for their Christmas shopping. Still, not all states followed suit.
The House of Representatives also intervened. They drafted and passed a resolution which stated that Thanksgiving Day will be on the last Thursday of November. However, the Senate later amended this to the fourth Thursday in November which has been the date Thanksgiving is celebrated since.
Many artists over the centuries have depicted hell in various ways, although most of them often involved fire, brimstone, people wailing, and what looked like demons or ghouls. Japanese artists have also been very creative in the way they illustrated hell or "jigoku". In fact, from the 12th to the 19th century, there have been many depictions of hell from Japanese artists. And a book has been published collating all of them in 600 pages.
There's the classic one shown above from the Jigoku-Zoshi, or hell scroll, showing flames coming out like tendrils from the ground with people trapped inside and big ogres with clubs making sure they don't get out.
Another picture shows a large monster with a horse's head and a human body holding a spear, apparently directing a toppling group of people from the inner gate of hell toward a deeper region.
Perhaps the weirdest one shows a demon flattening a human with a stick to make them into soba noodles.
With the prompts, DALL-E created a water/psychic type humanoid Pokemon named Democraflux for Biden, with white hair, a suit robe, and a signature move called "Unity Aura" that does exactly what the name suggests: it unites people. For Trump, DALL-E aptly made a fire/normal type Pokemon named Trumpertantrum, that looks like a chicken, and features his signature fiery locks and a trumpet for a beak. Finally, RFK got Justicarion, a fighting/flying type Pokemon, that looks like an eagle with green and brown feathers.
There are characteristics that DALL-E was spot on when creating the Pokemon, particularly how it designed Trump's Pokemon which was a playful and clever way of incorporating various personality traits of Trump. But Gillespie disagrees with other aspects such as those for Biden and RFK's Pokemon.
Brutalist architecture is a minimalist style that emphasizes the bare building materials and structural elements over artistic flourishes or decorative designs. Many college campuses in the US were constructed using this style resulting in buildings that look drab and nondescript.
In this video from Vox, they look at Evans Hall in the University of California Berkley, which has been rumored to be slated for demolition. Despite denials from the administration saying no such plans are under way, there have been subtle hints that point toward an eventual demolition of the building. The reason: because of poor seismic ratings.
That reason, however, is unconvincing as there are more buildings within campus that have similar seismic ratings. So, the real reason: because it obstructs views of San Francisco and beyond, which might be a roundabout way of saying that it looks ugly.
Still, many proponents of brutalist architecture are trying to raise awareness about the good sides of brutalism. It may not be like the postmodern architectural style featuring asymmetrical geometry, colorful facades, and playful designs, but they contend that brutalist buildings are expressive and bold. Truly, many brutalist buildings are imposing and very striking in their appearance.
So, before we start hating on these brutalist buildings, maybe we can try to see the good in them.
Rewards programs are good business models to keep consumers loyal to a brand. Airlines use frequent flyer programs to deliver additional value to customers without having to incur additional costs. However, many passengers might be wondering why frequent flyer programs frequently change the rules of their benefits. A couple of business professors gives us the down and dirty about frequent flyer programs.
Essentially, airlines don't make much profit from ticket sales, they say. Instead, they get the most value from baggage fees, ticket change fees, and frequent flyer programs. You may wonder, how do airlines make profit from frequent flyer programs?
For one, the annual fees in maintaining a rewards credit card gives them extra revenues for a very low cost. Another is the interest that accumulates from unpaid balances when using the rewards card. So, the best way to maximize profit is to induce people to keep using these rewards programs.
However, they keep changing the rules depending on economic conditions. Airlines companies need to find the right balance on when to apply stricter rules for their frequent flyer programs and when to relax them. That's why during the pandemic era, they changed the rules to reward people based on the miles they've traveled versus dollars spent, since there were fewer people traveling anyway.
But now, since the world has returned to a more normal state, they have tightened the rules again. So, the business professors suggest that if you plan on getting a rewards card, get one that gives cash back, instead of airplane miles. At least you can use the cash for something else.
Getting a headache when inebriated is par for the course. Anybody who has experienced hangovers would know the aftermath of a wild night of partying and drinking a lot of alcohol. But that's not what red wine headache (RWH) is exactly.
Usually, one might experience getting a headache after waking up from a hangover, but red wine headache is reported to occur even when individuals have only consumed small to moderate amounts of red wine. So it's not about the drunkenness of an individual. But what exactly causes it?
The fact that RWH sparsely occurs and only in very specific individuals might give us a hint that there is a substance in red wine to which somebody reacts negatively. Some have pointed to sulfites as the source of RWH, but the fact that white wine has more sulfites in it, and yet seldom do people report having migraine-like headaches from drinking white wine, which eliminates sulfites as the cause.
Another possible suspect was histamine. There are people allergic to histamine and what it does is that it makes the blood vessels dilate which causes a headache. However, studies have shown no correlation between histamine and RWH.
Gabrielle Ruiz is the voice actress who plays T'Lyn on the Star Trek comedy show Lower Decks. She's available for appearances on Cameo, an online celebrity video message service. For one happy Trekkie, she sang the "Happy Birthday" song in T'Lyn's Vulcan language.
Memory Alpha, the Star Trek wiki tells us that the Vulcan language isn't quite as developed and formalized as the Klingon language (in which you can also listen to "Happy Birthday"), but fans and linguists have worked on it since the 1960s. It is a most logical language with a beautiful script that made many appearances on the Enterprise series.
Around twenty thousand Native Americans fought in the Civil War. But on which side? Did they fight for the Union in solidarity with the enslaved people of the South? Or did they fight for the Confederacy to get back at the United States for their own mistreatment? The truth is, they fought for both sides, with way more volunteering for the Confederacy, but for neither of the reasons above. There were many reasons a Native American joined one army or the other, which just shows us the danger of generalizing a large group of people, and the danger of assigning modern motives to people in previous centuries.
After the Civil War, Native Americans fought in all US wars, and continue to this day to sign up in higher percentages than other ethnic groups. Read an overview of Native Americans in military uniforms, with a good look at the Navajo Code Talkers, at Messy Nessy Chic.
Wars and rumors of wars. Fire and brimstone. Deadly plagues and pestilence. The total collapse of society. The threat of an impending apocalypse hits differently in 2023, because we already have those things. In fact, some folks might see the end of days as an improvement on what we have now. Once again, Ryan George (previously at Neatorama) plays all the parts as he gets some reactions from people on the street, who are quite credulous in order to fit this all into a short skit, but don't react the way the street preacher would prefer them to. Despite all that, the end is almost hopeful. And the horse joke can be read in more ways than one. The skit is only 3:10; the rest is an ad. -via Geeks Are Sexy
Janelle Shane at AI Weirdness once again pitted different AI algorithms against each other, this time to give us a Thanksgiving spread. She asked DALL-E3 to generate images of the feast with labels, from a list generated by ChatGPT-4. The food looks good (although we are running low on gravy), but the names of the dishes are priceless.
There are more images, including one with a groaning board of desserts. Shane got into a conversation with ChatGPT-4 over whether the dessert labels were correct in the image, and got varying answers leading us to think that the algorithm just wants to please its programmer. The program Bard disagreed with ChatGPT-4 on that, and read the labels as
Pies: Pumpkin Pie, Cockles Pie, Apple Pie, Chess Pie, and Cheese Coales Pie Cookies: Thinssving, BPOWHIES, BRIINES, and BROESCKE Brownies: SIEHECADODOVAN and POKY
When you see the dessert image, you'll see how wrong both the labels and the program reading the labels are. I'd still like to try that pople pie. See all the images and read of the difficulty AI has in recreating our traditional feast. -via Nag on the Lake
I have owned several handheld consoles throughout my childhood. Now that I have given away most of them, I can only use emulators if I want to play them again. But they don't have the same joy of holding the console with your two hands.
In comes Anbernic's RG35XX Plus. It's inspired by the old Game Boy design, and it allows you to play almost every portable game created and more. It is touted to play PSP, NDS, DOS, DC, and even PSX games. Moreover, the Plus version is now equipped with 5G WiFi and Bluetooth 4.2.
For anyone who lived through all the gaming consoles and wants to experience the nostalgia of playing them again but all in one device, the RG35XX Plus offers that and more. Of course, for games that require special features like the touchscreen of the DS or D-pad controls, Anbernic sells variations of their handheld console to accommodate those needs. Check out their website to see their other products.
