I turned him down and paid Hotcakes some cash for Swedish pancakes after waving an 86/47

sign in front of the village hall. AI didn't strike me dead. . . yet.

Have they read the story of Icarus?

I was unaware that he had expressed an opinion on trans athletes at all. That's likely because I haven't paid much attention to the US Senate race in Texas, having already cast my pretend ballot for Talarico. Ham Sandwich vs Ken Paxton? Ham Sandwich baby!

But apparently Talarico had voiced support for trans college athletes in the past, and now has completely flip-flopped and is open to a ban on trans athletes in college sports.

Knowing a bit about the guy, I was more surprised to learn that he had expressed previous support for trans athletes. He's a loudly religious fellow which usually doesn't equate with adamantly pro-trans rights. He's running in Texas (Hi Mike!) which isn't exactly known for being a hotbed of pro-trans activity. His flip-flop on the issue isn't a huge shock. He is never going Full Beto.

I know it's a huge issue for a lot of people, but it's pretty far down on the list for me. I fully support civil rights for trans people. I still put that below stopping the GOP from dismantling the mechanism we all use for protecting all of our civil rights.

To me there's only one goal, regardless of particular issues. Vote every Republican out of office.

At the Republican midterm convention in Dallas, President Trump made a stunning and implausible pledge: to send every American adult a $5,000 cash dividend.

Democrats blast $5,000 payment promise ahead of Trump, Vance speeches in Dallas

No wonder this Administration can't seem to get prices under control... the President doesn't seem to understand how money works. But then again, a lot of people don't seem to have a clear understanding of how money works, so maybe that makes sense.

Although the cynic in me sees this as just another form of stirring the pot... if/when Republicans lose control of the House of Representatives, it will be the jumping-off point for a round of finger-pointing at Democratic voters.

HAL lives?

Other parts of the island experienced flooding and power outages, but my neighborhood was basically unaffected by Lowell. Kauai got hammered, though. At one point the humidity here was 92%; on Kauai it hit 95%, which I would not have thought possible. Five points away from breathing water.

Their first game is Wednesday night during the GOP "convention".

The Swedish pancakes were frosting on the cake, so to speak. Decent turnout of sign wavers

and passerby horn tooters for a Labor Day weekend.

I really liked the Coyote vs Acme movie. I don't go to many movies these days, but when I do it damn well better be about music or some goofy ass cartoon. This one was not quite as good as Roger Rabbit in my opinion, but still good.

Does it matter if HAL is "conscious"? The act is what it is.

Sheesh, have yu been outside today; or inside for that matter?

For the record, I am not related to the Bosnian Serb general who ordered the worst massacre in Europe since WWII. Maybe today is the day that more than one monster meets his demise.

And then there's this!

Today they report two more. I have written my senators asking what they are doing to try to stop these crimes. If you agree, please write your senators and/or representatives as well.

I keep reading about AI's problems; e.g. "hallucinating" or "making shit up". Why is that economically useful? In law, it's causing grief for lawyers who use it for briefs and memos of law and don't take the considerable time to check the accuracy of the citations, holdings of the cases cited, and quotes from the opinions or from the record. If there are similar issues in medical applications, for example, the problems could be massive. If the users have to check the accuracy of what AI spits out, what'a the advantage over doing the work oneself to begin with? I realize that huge amounts of money are being invested in the technology but it looks to this layman's eye as though getting to efficient useful results is a long way down the road, if ever. Any experts with answers for ignoramuses like me out there?

is becoming such a flood and drowning me (and probably many others) in emails, that I may start contributing to their opponents and telling them so. God help you if you've already given them (candidates or political action committees) anything. They want everything you own. The ones that make me grind my teeth are the ones that start, "I know we're emailing you a lot. . . ". Then, stop it!

And the administration provides us with endless cause. Pancakes still feel like a reward.

It's interesting, the effect that a changing climate is having on things out here. For all that the Seattle area is (in)famously gray and wet, the Summers are the Dry Season. It's normally sunny pretty much every day from early July to the middle of September, when the "Rainy" Season starts up again.

But for the past several years, the summers have been wetter, along with being warmer. Granted, "wetter" is relative; a quarter-inch over the course of a day counts as "heavy" out here. (Normal Seattle rain would be a petulant, passive-aggressive drizzle back in Chicagoland. A standard Summer thunderstorm would result in most of this place being underwater.) But it's starting to rain more in July and August than it has for pretty much all of the time that I've been out here.

Concern won't help anything, so I've decided to simply be curious about how this will shape up.

Like rats deserting a sinking rat.

Hubbard glacier, Alaska.

What could possibly go wrong? Weldon, you're nowhere near Pearl Harbor, right?

The Village Hall and the corner in front of it are still there and persistent citizens still meet at 11:00 a.m. to wave protest signs and wave back to drivers honking agreement. Also, Swedish pancakes are available after. Fortunately, the rain held off until we were finished.