WTF-Beta

For Musk, the cost of harming the delicate ocean ecosystem is outweighed by the benefits of space exploration.

“If the [Starship] did hit a whale, it’s like, honestly, that whale had it coming, cause the odds are so low,” Musk said in October while campaigning for Donald Trump. “It’s like Final Destination: The Whale Edition. It’s like fate had it in for that whale.”

Musk, SpaceX and the White House did not return requests for comment.

https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2025/jul/17/hawaii-elon-musk-spacex-rocket-debris

The full episodes of Geoffrey Baer's Most Beautiful Places in Chicago:

https://www.wttw.com/most-beautiful-places-in-chicago/watch

Fan of tarragon here also. Pistachios sound like a good idea.

Interesting bit of Chicago architectural and piano (watch the video) history.

https://www.wttw.com/most-beautiful-places-in-chicago/dazzling-homes/glessner-house

Julia Child's recipe for chicken salad. Sounds like it could be a real winner.

https://www.msn.com/en-us/foodanddrink/foodnews/i-tried-julia-child-s-recipe-for-chicken-salad-and-now-i-ll-never-make-it-any-other-way/ar-AA1IHB78

@Steve-Miller I first tried kimchi many years ago but am a little conflicted about it. I love the spicy fermented cabbage part but am not a fan of garlic. I know, I know, you can all disown me now. And like its German cousin sauerkraut, it's very high in sodium. I mean, that's how they preserve it! I continue to be able to manage my blood pressure without meds, so I do watch my sodium pretty carefully.

There was a kimchi brand that had super interesting variations that were really wonderful. I used to get it at Fresh Thyme and I think Costco may have carried it back then, maybe six or seven years ago. I'll be damned if I can remember the name of the company.

There was another recipe that uses a combo of coconut milk and regular milk. And the recipe is scaled down for an 8x8 pan, which might be nice. I might try it sometime:

https://zhangcatherine.com/pumpkin-butter-mochi/

It also suggests using an oiled knife to cut the mochi.

My Lithuanian friends stopped by to sing Ilgiausiu Metu (aka Happy Birthday) to you:

It's a year on and I finally got around to making pumpkin mochi cake! I checked out some other recipes (I was a little concerned about the amount of sugar in the version that SK posted). I ended up going with this one:

https://www.mochimommy.com/pumpkin-mochi-recipe/

It uses less sugar and gives the option of using a can of evaporated milk in addition to the condensed milk. It also has some pumpkin pie spices in it, which I thought would appeal to Mr wtg. I didn't end up using the evap milk, but I could see how the addition of it would make the mochi cake closer to pumpkin pie. Leaving it out makes it a bit more cakey.

Finished product is quite good. Sweet, but not too sweet, and the pie spices are subtle but give a nice extra something. I actually think I will like it better after it is refrigerated. I had my test slice with some whipped cream; Mr wtg had his straight, no extras.

Mr wtg loves the butter chicken. And I'm a fan of the palak paneer.

Not a new product, but we recently bought some of the liver pate with truffles. We'd forgotten how much we love it. On fresh bread with some of those spicy pickled skewers I posted about yesterday (Costco). Num.

And I bought some Shropshire Blue cheese. I think that's a new product for them.

I assume you have your wine list.

Wow. That is some house. Beautifully restored and decorated. Price has been reduced twice for a total of $50k. Why isn’t it selling?

WTF is going on with Trump and the Epstein file??

The Justice Department on Wednesday fired Maurene Comey from the United States Attorney's Office for the Southern District of New York, where she most recently led the prosecution of Sean "Diddy" Combs, multiple sources told ABC News.

A spokesman for the U.S. Attorney's Office in Manhattan declined to comment. A spokesperson for the Justice Department did not immediately respond to a call for comment.

Comey was a highly regarded assistant U.S. attorney who successfully prosecuted Ghislaine Maxwell, the former associate of sex offender Jeffrey Epstein, and multiple gang members before the split verdict earlier this month in the trial of Combs, who was convicted of a prostitution-related charge but acquitted of more serious charges.

Comey was also involved in the office's case against Epstein, who died by suicide in 2019 at New York City's Metropolitan Correctional Center while he was awaiting trial on federal sex trafficking charges.

Comey is the daughter of former FBI director James Comey, who President Donald Trump fired during his first term in office because he initiated the Russia investigation.

According to sources, Trump privately vented about having a Comey work in his administration.

https://abcnews.go.com/US/maurene-comey-fired-doj-southern-district-new-york/story?id=123817739

William Shakespeare was in danger of being canceled. He was a big fan of ­mind-altering ­drugs—especially cannabis. But the Church of England looked down on live theater because of its “unwholesome” moral content and was keeping an eye out for plays to shut down; plus, city officials had to approve plays before they could be performed within the city limits. So, if Shakespeare had dared to admit publicly that he smoked cannabis, it might have ended his career.

That’s right, Shakespeare was a stoner. I’m not making this up—they found the evidence in his backyard. Back in 2001, some anthropologists got permission from a museum to borrow ­twenty-four clay pipe fragments that had been dug up in the small town of Stratford-upon-Avon, where Shakespeare used to live. Using state-of-the-art forensic technology, the anthropologists discovered cannabis residue on eight of ­them—including several from Shakespeare’s backyard ­garden—that dated back to the late 1500s/early 1600s, around the time he actually lived there.

https://lithub.com/did-shakespeare-write-hamlet-while-he-was-stoned/

Inside a federal immigration courtroom in New York City last month, a judge took an exceedingly unusual step: declining to state the name of the Immigration and Customs Enforcement attorney pressing to deport asylum seekers.

“We’re not really doing names publicly,” said Judge ShaSha Xu — after stating her own name and those of the immigrants and their lawyers. It was the first of two separate instances The Intercept identified in which judges chose to withhold the identities of the attorneys representing the Trump administration’s deportation regime.

As ICE agents across the country wear masks to raid workplaces and detain immigrants, government attorneys need not cover their faces to shield their identities. Legal experts who spoke to The Intercept agreed the practice of concealing the lawyers’ identities was both novel and concerning.

“I’ve never heard of someone in open court not being identified,” said Elissa Steglich, a law professor and co-director of the Immigration Clinic at the University of Texas at Austin. “Part of the court’s ethical obligation is transparency, including clear identification of the parties. Not identifying an attorney for the government means if there are unethical or professional concerns regarding [the Department of Homeland Security], the individual cannot be held accountable. And it makes the judge appear partial to the government.”

“Part of the court’s ethical obligation is transparency, including clear identification of the parties.”

The concealment shocked two lawyers who were representing immigrants in Xu’s courtroom. Attorney Jeffrey Okun, who was representing a client via video call, characterized the move as “bizarre.” Attorney Hugo Gonzalez Venegas called Xu’s behavior “a terrible lack of transparency on the part of officers of the court.”

From The Intercept:

https://archive.is/CqMkl

@Jodi said in Canadians are still angry:

my favorite store ever, Mardens

Just looked it up. Looks like my kinda place.

Ha! It's at Costco in Glenview. Albacore Tuna in Spicy Olive Oil. Three cans for $15, like half the price of buying directly from Fishwife.

edit: Also checked the Costco in Cincy, the one they call Deerfield on Waterstone. They have the same spicy tuna. Low stock. The Costco app lets you look at items in individual stores. Just click on Warehouse at the bottom of the app to get to the warehouse search.

edit edit: Also Amazon, from Fishwife, at prices lower than directly through their website. And Target.

They claim to have super high quality stuff and all the sharks on Shark Tank thought the items they tasted were wonderful. I don't know if they really have wonderful fish, or if their packaging/branding is appealing and gets people to pay a premium for something you could get elsewhere.

edit: I just looked at their store locator, and it looks like their products are sold at a number of places in my area. Including a couple of Costcos. Will investigate further.