It seems appropriate that the gadget shows up on a website named odditycentral. The concept is very interesting and related to some other wind-powered digital instruments that cost 100s of times more, but the implementation looks minimally functional. I'd have to classify it more as a novelty than a game-changer. Maybe it's a digital kazoo. Big Al

Oooh, I’ll see if we can rearrange over here, too!

For my work, I am using a 2016 edition of Office, and the software lives on my hard drive. There is no connection to the cloud whatsoever. However I have a tablet and another laptop that use the online Office subscription, so I will definitely do as you report here for options. I didn't have any trouble finding an earlier edition of Office and getting it to work on my Win7 machine. One of the reasons for doing this is not wanting the intrusions of later versions of Windows. It's strictly for my writing. Web surfing and research happen on the tablet, which is run by Android. Thought I'd mention this in case anyone else here would like to escape Win11.

An excellent explanation, Dol. Thanks!

Yep. That’s him.

Thanks, Jon. That is heartening in an otherwise bleak landscape. It does fit a pattern of Montanans voting both ways at the same time. The same Montana voters who adore Trump also love our Liberian refugee black mayor who is a total liberal. Politics is very personal here. We lost one of the best Senators in Montana history--Jon Tester--voting instead for a Trumpist carpetbagger who insults Indians and wants to privatize public lands and ban all abortion--while at the same time passing a ballot initiative that gives a constitutional right to abortion. Go figure. I can't.

Not a holiday theme, but around this time of year the NYC Transit Museum brings out some of the old train cars and runs them on a short route from a subway station in the lower east side of Manhattan.

@ShiroKuro said in Package thieves stealing iPhones: How do they know that it's a phone that's been delivered? One theory is that someone on the inside (of ATT, for instance) gets hold of the tracking numbers for phone shipments.

Those are great. The black dog with the ladybug is super.

I remember signs like that on gas stations when we traveled around the country on family vacations in the 60s. Another one that got our attention when it got to be the end of day and we were looking for a place to stay - air conditioned and has a swimming pool! [image: 59a7d82dd4bf6bd803ad0c35e7f438d4.jpg]

Salmon behavior is amazing. Watched salmon fighting their way up tiny creeks I could straddle near a campground in Alaska. They also taste great.

@pique said in Society is Doomed, Scientists Say: I feel comforted that even if human society is doomed, the planet will recover without us. No kidding. https://www.popsci.com/science/earth-without-humans/?utm_placement=newsletter

Berkshire Hathaway, the stock that's basically a mutual fund...

A student in America asked an artificial intelligence program to help with her homework. In response, the app told her "Please Die." The eerie incident happened when 29-year-old Sumedha Reddy of Michigan sought help from Google’s Gemini chatbot large language model (LLM), New York Post reported. The program verbally abused her, calling her a “stain on the universe.” Reddy told CBS News that she got scared and started panicking. “I wanted to throw all of my devices out the window. I hadn’t felt panic like that in a long time to be honest,” she said. The assignment Reddy was working on involved identifying and solving challenges that adults face with age. The program blurted out words that hit the student hard and were akin to bullying https://www.wionews.com/world/please-die-you-are-a-stain-on-the-universe-ai-chatbot-tells-girl-seeking-help-for-homework-776635

I know. I was totally amazed by what they did.