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That sucks. Haven’t had a hot pocket since my early 20s either, but from what I remember the biggest issue would be some parts would be molten hot while other parts would be barely heated at all.

Hilarious. So if a man breaks an oath, you must kill him and banner men by breaking a sacred guest rite. It really depends on Jon and the rest of the Starks. If a Stark survives (including Jon in this) they would have to make an example of the Freys.

Except the number of people affected so far is zero.

After a pretty hectic day, no energy to prep dinner, and really poor options for take out food at the grocery, I relented to my kid and picked up a hot pocket for them and a microwave burrito for myself. (To their joy since we virtually never eat that kinda processed stuff). Now I haven't had a microwave burrito since college and hot pockets since before that, but I'll be damned if they haven't shrunk by 50% and are virtually all bread. It used to be the issue was that they were so overstuffed you'd have to avoid burning yourself with the molten hot cheese fillings, now it may as well been a 5 day old croissant stuffed with a couple chunks of pepperoni and a pinch of cheese.

Just caught up on the latest, and that episode was mostly mess. They clearly did, yet I' love to know how the EPs sold this pacing.

I noticed that with tuna a few months ago. Haven't bought tuna in recently and now with shrinkflation, forget it!

I opened a tin of tuna for the first time in years today. There was barely enough fish for a sandwich. Fucking shrinkflation. I hate it.

While a prisoner of Tywin.

I think the argument "very few people are affected" is a dangerous one, because it cuts both ways. If one argues that any unfairness in athletics is of little concern because there aren't very many trans women competing, someone else could argue that employment discrimination against trans women in, say, the sciences, also wouldn't matter. After all, just how many trans women scientists are there? Seems to me that if something is unfair, it's unfair no matter how many people are affected.

Okay, you should be able to then tell me what trans woman is out there currently that is absolutely dominating her sport. Or were you insinuating that Serena Williams is trans? Because to my knowledge the number of professional or even amateur athletes that are trans and are crushing their sport is...zero. If you don't, why are you talking about it then?

I do find it funny how Greg Abbot is saying that anti semitism is not allowed in Texas and that all the protestors should be arrested for it, which the decrying of anti semitism is clearly a crock of shit given how back in Dec of 2023 they first rejected a ban on associating with Nazi sympathizers and Holocaust deniers. https://www.texastribune.org/2023/12/02/texas-gop-antisemitism-resolution/ Also, now they want to police speech when they decried people rallying at universities years ago to counter the likes of Richard Spencer and other far right provocateurs that had ties to neo nazis and anti semites. Hell, Colleges and Universities that gave such people a platform said they had to because freedom of speech and they are about an exchange of ideas. Frankly, having militarized police shut things down is making this more of an issue than the actual protests would have if allowed to just continue on.

Arizona House votes to repeal controversial 1864 abortion ban, with help of 3 Republicans National Republicans and Trump should send those 3 Arizona Republicans a pretty awesome gift basket, cuz that law was going to be killer for them in November. ETA: To be clear the state Senate hasn’t repealed the law yet, I just expect they will.

The US is still funding it and supplying them with arms, which is bad enough. Some of the universities, like Columbia, have endowment investment in companies that are doing business with Israel, like Amazon and Google (they have a $1.2bn cloud-computing contract with the state’s government), and Microsoft who has services used by Israel’s ministry of defense and Israeli civil administration. Then you have have some of their investments with Lockheed Martin.

This really sucks man, I’ve been there. Well not exactly there, but I’ve been in a few love triangles with close friends over the years. My advice would be if you really can’t get over her, you need to cut off contact. Of course that’s just me - and naturally it gets even worse and more lonely at first - but eventually you do move on.

You are not alone, truuuuuust me.

While Westeros does have also a culture of gigantic architecture, Essosi architecture is vastly superior to Westeros'. And not just in Yi Ti and Asshai, obviously, but also in Qarth and even Volantis and Braavos. Just think about the size of the great cities of Yi Ti or the comparison of the Red Temple of Volantis to the Red Keep. Or, more importantly, the comparison of the towns along the Rhoyne to the cities of Westeros. Yes, they have slavery, but we don't know how crucial slavery is to YiTish culture, say. Westeros is stuck in perpetual feudalism with effectively no social mobility and no education for anyone living outside a castle or a city - which is the bulk of the people. The Free Cities do have social mobility for adventurers and bravos (not only) via the free companies, it also allows for the rise of humble merchants and scoundrels to the level of magisters (Rego Draz, Illyrio Mopatis). And you can also rise to prominence via piracy. Something like Davos' career is a very lucky accident which only happens in a civil war setting when you have the luck to help a crucial member of the victorious faction. City culture is also more an Essosi thing - and in that sense Oldtown would also more an Essosi city as it seems clear that the entire city culture there was shaped by developed due to the trade connections and cultural exchange between the place and Valyria and its colonies (and the Summer Isles, etc.).

State of the comments.

Wait..is this a typo or are you actually saying there are no issues you care about that you haven’t formally organized for? Cuz the latter seems pretty haughty.

The Democratic Convention this year is in Chicago. So more like shades of 1968!

We’ve been heavily linked with him so that makes sense. I don’t know enough about him honestly but if he’s a similar profile, I’m all for it. I’ve seen him play a few times and was never impressed but could have just been the game state or talent around him.

The Dune Encyclopedia has a nice and much better alternative version of the Butlerian fanatics as a religious conflict which is instigated when some man-machines in a culture ran effectively by thinking machines in the sense that many decisions are handed to computers and such decide to abort the unborn child of Jehane Butler. Eventually it is taken over by mercenaries and adventurers, etc. Something like that they even had in the expanded edition prologue of the Lynch movie where pre-Butlerian people are lazy and complacent and 'run by' machines rather than being the victims of some kind of silly Skynet-like evil computer. Yes, it is clear that the other enemy there would have been some other culture/group grown out of the Scattering, definitely not evil robots pulled out of the ass of the fan fiction gang. That said - in light of the fact that Herbert decided to reinvent the Tleiluxu as a deeply religious people combined with the fact that Scytale came back as a master and is carrying gene material stretching back to the era of Paul it strikes me as likely that the intention there was to go 'full circle' or 'back to the beginning' to a point in the final book. Not to Butler stuff, but to the original Dune era, and, of course, to add a final twist to the Golden Path plan of Leto II. Some parts of him were still kind of alive in the new sandworms and that should have played a real role, too. And it seems clear that his breeding program - while also undercutting the foresight Kwisatz Haderach stuff for good - did more than just that. We see that in the descendants of Siona. They are a different breed of superhumans. We also have that 'back to the beginning' and 'a final unification' thing in the final Duncan Idaho gaining the memories of all the Duncan Idahos. That would have been important, too. Sad part is that they apparently shot that scene and many others ... and he decided to not include it and the others. The movies are stunning visually and greatly adapt the core story, but not much else. Yueh, for instance, lacks screentime in part 1, as does Thufir in part 2. And, of course, them not elaborating on Chani's connection to Liet-Kynes. Her wanting 'to save' Arrakis through secular science rather than religious nonsense because she was her mother's daughter could have greatly helped there. I imagine they had such scenes there but they were cut, too. It is clear in part 1 that Liet's role with the Fremen was supposed to elaborated later on. While I agree that this is the first adaptation making it clear that Paul is going to be a monster - or a the figurehead of a monstrously fanatical movement - the movie undercuts that message by having the Great Houses opposing his rise to the throne in the end. That is then the explanation/justification for the Fremen crusade ... whereas in the book Paul has all the power he and the Fremen could want and the latter still want to butcher billions in their misguided zealotry. There is no political justification nor even a pretext for the jihad in the book. And it is clear that all Paul can do is stand by and rubberstamp the wishes and deeds of the fanatics. If he were to try to stop them, he would be killed and the war be done in his name, anyway. Cutting the first Leto babe was okay, turning Alia into Jessicalia not so much. My biggest gripe with part 2 is that the Fremen are portrayed as a colonized people whose technology/abilities are inferior to the technology/soldiers of the Harkonnens - which goes directly against the books as even Fremen women and children can hold their own to a point against the Sardaukar. In a very real sense Paul is the victim of Fremen culture and ideology. Yes, the Bene Gesserit shaped their religion in the past, but as things take up steam he can only play the role of savior as they want it to be ... or he can die. He doesn't actually control things. He is little more than a catalyst. All he succeeds at is staying alive and getting his revenge, but nothing else. The movie shows that part rather well at the gathering when he visibly plays a role for their benefit there ... and that is what he has to do the entire time. That kind of stuff continues in Messiah and Children when we get to the trope of the blind seer and finally to Alia's 'possession'. Things are governed by religious rules and superstition. A living god/savior's power is, in the end, ruled by the rules and tenets of the religion he is a part of.

Aren't you a bit quick to forget where this discussion is happening? Though I suppose that, if you're on the truly cynical side of things, you could argue that Martin killed himself as an author. Ah, shit. It really is the end times then.

You can't, alas. But you can link to an offsite source.

The Ocheretyne situation is concerning. It looks like Ukraine can contain it but it might be touch and go. The good news is that it's the Russian forces from Avdiivka who are advancing there and they've been badly mauled. If Russia reinforces with fresh troops, that could be more concerning but with the new draft reportedly put off until June, Russia has to make do with the forces it has along the front. Russia might also have to face a choice between reinforcing this apparent success or focusing on Chasiv Yar. The forces they have available for the latter campaign feel tight, so if they start sending troops to the Avdiivka front they might start stretching themselves thin. Ukraine is maintaining the bridgehead at Krynky and seems to have made some offensive assaults in that sector recently, interestingly. One idea floating for a while was that if Ukraine has to give ground near Avdiivka - and they can perhaps afford to there - they might be able to reinforce a sucker punch from Kherson to the coast through the Krynky sector and cut off Crimea whilst blowing the bridge at the same time, which might just cause total chaos in Crimea. There's been umming and ahhing over whether that's realistic or a good idea or far too risky, but with this new supply line and much longer-range weapons, it might become viable. It could also change the entire geostrategic outlook of the war and put Russia really on the back foot. The slight problem is really getting the momentum to do that, which is hard when you have to cross one of the biggest rivers in Europe near its mouth with limited ways of getting across, in order to resupply.

Ooh, no. I'm with the Frenchman on this one. As material existence becomes more and more token the importance of human inspiration in art is even more important. To remind us that we live for more than imminent comfort.