You probably weren't doomering hard enough...

Latest forecasts don't envision petroleum traffic to return to anything like normal through all of 2027.

Hey, look! (No, seriously, look. Don't just see.)

On the difference between seeing and observing:

The first step in the decision cycle is Observing. This is analogous to the “situational awareness” that is often mentioned but rarely defined.

If it’s described at all, it’s with phrases like “Checking one’s six” or “scanning the environment”, but it’s entirely possible to look around and not see, and even seeing isn’t the same as observing. Reducing it to the simplest example, if you are lying on your back in your bed and you wake up and open your eyes, then photons are going to bounce off the ceiling and hit your retinas. You are looking at the ceiling, you are even seeing it, but you are not observing the ceiling, let alone the entirety of your room...

Go RTWT...

How many people in this picture are really aware of their surroundings?

Midweek Meme Dump!

Life in the Panopticon...

Not only is your LG television spying on you, your LG computer monitor may be installing bloatware on your system behind your back...

LG's Smart TV features being overly intrusive is common among smart TVs, but LG's newer UltraGear computer monitors are now also taking liberties with user privacy and security.

On some Windows systems, connecting a new LG monitor will spur Windows Update to download drivers and the LG Monitor App Installer, which will then display pop-up ads for other LG applications or even McAfee antivirus software. This is disappointing news to say the least, but fortunately my LG UltraGear 27GL850-B doesn't seem to be impacted.

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Hey, look!

"Great-great-grandpa survived malaria, typhus and Spanish Mauser bullets and came home with his trusty Springfield floptop. In the intervening years, the wooden forearm had been shortened and the barrel had been chopped back to a more manageable length for stalking whitetail in the laurel groves of the Appalachians, and at some point, a Lyman peep sight had been added to the old tomato stake, but that timeworn militia rifle had been making meat every autumn since William McKinley was in office. It was just in for a checkup."

Bringback firearms, both captured war trophies and issued... uh, "souvenirs" ...were common among our nation's citizen soldiers for most of two centuries.

Meme Dump!

Tab Clearing...

• "Quick! Announce talks are re-starting before the markets open this morning!"


• Ghost Bikes


• Do the Euros have the stomach for a fight?

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Memes On A Monday!

Meme Dump!

Automotif DCXXXI...

A Mercedes-Benz SL class of the latest (2022-present) R232 generation, photographed with a Nikon Z fc and an 18-140mm f/3.5-6.3 zoom lens.

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Meme Dump!

Now it can be told...

The reason I was in Nebraska last month was for a product launch event for a new Leupold optic, the LCO Pro F2. The format of the event was a 1½ day class, followed a mini carbine match, during which I had the opportunity to put several hundred rounds downrange using the new dot.

Hornady hosted the event at the excellent Heartland Public Shooting Park just outside Grand Island.

Kyle Lamb instructed us media types in the use of the carbine...

...aided by Doug Koenig.

I'll expand further in print elsewhere, but in short, Leupold is gearing up to go hard into the high-end duty grade electro optics biz again, since they're one of a small handful of companies who can credibly play in that end of the pool.

Chris Cerino lighting up a target.

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Friday Memes!

Tuxedos and Origin Stories

Gorillafritz has an interesting tale on professional attire for firearms instructors and the origins of the "tactical tuxedo".

"I was there, Gandalf..." (photo by Oleg Volk)

The shoot-me-first vest in that photo is an O.G. one from Royal Robbins. I bought it in late '01 or very early '02, before there was a company called "5.11 Tactical"*. The buttons still have the little hiking dude from the famously granola-y outdoor apparel company.

To this day I prefer Royal Robbins for my gun burkhas.

*The Wikipedia article has a good history of how 5.11 Tactical came to be.

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Some Memes to Pull You Over the Hump!

Meme Dump!

Welcome back my friends to the show that never ends...

Me, Last Year: "I need to upgrade my Mac Mini to keep running Photoshop for work. I can save money by getting the smallest HDD since I never play games anymore."

Me, Last Week: "I need to de-stress. Maybe I'll take up WoW again."

Me, Yesterday: *googling 'how expand mac mini hard disk cheaply'*

When your first hard disk was a 20MB Seagate, it feels wild that with just MacOS, MS Word and Excel, Photoshop, and World of Warcraft, you've filled a 256GB HDD to the point that PShop is howling about its scratch disk size every time you open it.

"My little dude, nothing I ask you to do really requires much of a scratch disk."

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Monday Memeday!

Tab Clearing...

• The etiquette of pointing out another writer's errors.


• Now there's an automated ragebait generator.


• The summit of AI Hype Mountain is approaching.

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...and so it goes.

Senator Lindsey Graham (R-SC), fresh back from a trip to Kyiv, passed away suddenly last night.

Have a Few Memes!

Tab Clearing...

• Your favorite gadgets are getting way more expensive again. Thanks AI bubble!


• Cop caught on video stalking a woman by using a license plate reader.


• Waymo robotaxi delivers teen hooligans to the cops.

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Meme Dump!

Jerked by a Mechanical Turk

The latest iteration of the Neo domestic robot from startup manufacturer 1X has freakishly sensitive and mobile fingers. Very dextrous, pretty much the equivalent of human hands, capable of delicate chores like screwing in a light bulb, or... well, you know how people are.

Thing is, like most of these robots today, it's not entirely autonomous...

1X says the goal is full automation for Neo, but for now, the robot is partly teleoperated, as a Wall Street Journal video noted last year.

Some guy who works in a Singapore cubicle farm sits at the dinner table with a haunted, 1000yd stare.

“How was work today, honey?” asks his wife…

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Thank God It's Meme Dump!

There's a reason I refer to it as "Karens-Dot-Com".

The official yard sign of NextDoor and every neighborhood Facebook group ever.

NextDoor is largely populated by the Ladies Auxiliary of these guys...

Bonnie Tyler has left the building.

Like everyone else who secretly loved the shit out of the song "Total Eclipse of the Heart" and its bizarro video but was too cool to admit it, I am saddened by this news.

In tribute, the best spoof video of all time:

Meme Dump!