We haven’t heard too much from France lately, other than in the context of ball-kicking matches. The country is out of the World Cup, but how is France doing more generally? A photo of the French World Cup team doesn’t suggest economic greatness. The players wore jerseys with the … | Continue reading
Today in Evanston, Illinois: “Say No to AI Data Centers”. The Guardian says that the dream would be to find a data center that is used by ICE and involved in demanding IDs from voters: Speaking of ID, although everyone in Evanston seems to agree that requiring ID to vote is … | Continue reading
As the world’s aviation nerds gathering for EAA AirVenture (“Oshkosh”; July 20-26), let’s think a bit about the impact of aviation on human conflict… The Dambusters Raid, one of the most famous uses of aircraft during World War II, was the brainchild of Barnes Wallis, an aeronaut … | Continue reading
From a friend who uses LLMs to write code… Current state of affairs according to me: OpenAI is at the frontier. There is no reason to use Terra, as there is a Luna or Sol model at an effort level that matches it for cheaper. You can get quite a lot of inference out of the $20/mo … | Continue reading
You’ll die from the Canadian and Minnesotan (Somali?) smoke if you go outside in the north and from “dangerous” heat if you go outside in the south, says the NYT (front page): The smoke is due to “climate change”, according to Canada’s Prime Minister (NYT). How bad is it? avia … | Continue reading
CBS: Because federal tax dollars are free, of course, the CBS story covers what Medicare beneficiaries will pay ($50/month) and doesn’t mention what it will cost the young taxpayers who are being hit to pay for keeping Boomers alive forever (ChatGPT says $6 billion/year would … | Continue reading
As part of James Watson‘s continued cancelation, it is conventional to credit Rosalind Franklin with having figured out the structure of DNA from an X-ray diffraction image that she made prior to dying of cancer. In fact, Photo 51 was created by Raymond Gosling, born exactly 100 … | Continue reading
The cost of owning a house in the U.S. can go up 1,000% and it would have no effect on the government’s official inflation rate, updated this morning to 3.5 percent. That’s because the cost of an owned house is included in CPI by asking homeowners, who aren’t landlords, how much … | Continue reading
Today’s New York Times… A Mexican national whom we are informed was shot at random by ICE (they were looking for an undocument migrant and shot the unfortunate Mr. Lorenzo Salgado Araujo for no reason and, as it happened, Mr. Araujo was also an undocumented migrant (what are the … | Continue reading
Due to the magic of the Jones Act, it would be illegal for a German-built ship such as the magnificent Norwegian Joy to do an Alaska cruise from Seattle and stop only at U.S. ports, even if operated by a U.S.-based cruise line and staffed with an American crew. One perverse conse … | Continue reading
“The Post‑COVID Decline in the Labor Share” (by a group of Federal Reserve Bank economists) shows that, as the percentage of immigrants in the U.S. population increased (we opened our borders starting in 1965, but the effects were gradual at first), the percentage of income captu … | Continue reading
Seventeen years ago: These low-resolution (1280×768) displays were tweaked during coronapanic by adding touch sensitvity (a mixed blessing in a machine that is subject to turbulence), but essentially Garmin has been offering the same system for 17 years… until today. The web … | Continue reading
Photos from Day 2 (yesterday) of PBI’s reincarnation as DJT (“Donald J. Trump International Airport”)… A nod to Donald Trump’s famous passion for fine art: Purely functional signage: Note that the (1988) terminal remains dedicated to Navy fighter pilot David McCampbell, … | Continue reading
Happy World Population Day, except to Elon Musk who says that humans are going extinct and should have more children, while simultaneously Elon refuses to make a Tesla self-driving minivan. In honor of this glorious day, set up after the Earth’s population reached 5 billion in 1 … | Continue reading
We stopped into Ketchikan, Alaska, our last port in the Great Land. The first thing I found was the MV Malaspina, an Alaska Marine Highway ferry launched in 1963 that I took in 1993. She’s a Jones Act survivor that remained in service through 2022. Her sister ship, MV Matanuska, … | Continue reading
Today is a dark day for billionaire Democrats who’ve been avoiding New York City and New York State income tax by living 183 days per year in Palm Beach. Their Gulfstreams are now parked at “DJT”, President Donald J. Trump International Airport. Google is #Resisting. If you say t … | Continue reading
Where did the Huna Tlingit Indians forced by Climate Change to evacuate Glacier Bay circa 1800 end up? Just across Icy Strait in Hoonah. Right next to their town, after salmon canning became unprofitable, they set up a theme park for cruise ships called “Icy Strait Point”: Wha … | Continue reading
A migration enrichment story that ended badly for a native-born American (Fox): Suppose that Bekhzod Asrarov hadn’t killed anyone. How was his immigration to the U.S. in 2024 expected to make existing Americans better off? He won a “diversity lottery” at age 40 during the Bide … | Continue reading
100 percent of Maine’s progressive females have apparently had sex with 100 percent-disabled (according to our government experts) Graham Platner. At least one of these females now says that Platner raped her, but the rape wasn’t as bad as continued representation in the U.S. Sen … | Continue reading
Previously in this space… Sitka, Alaska Public Library Here’s a report on the rest of our late May 2026 visit, planned by ChatGPT: Take the free shuttle from the Sitka Sound Cruise Terminal into downtown; the terminal says its complimentary shuttle runs during port hours and ave … | Continue reading
ChatGPT’s first cut at a day off the cruise ship in Skagway, Alaska (6:30 am-7 pm): This is probably your most natural hiking day. Do Lower Dewey Lake in the morning; it’s a real forest/lake hike close to town and cruise piers, and multiple Alaska cruise hiking guides recommend … | Continue reading
Our loyal reader and thoughtful commenter Alex Kowalski died of cancer two years ago (see Rest in Peace, Alex Kowalski). A few of us got together on some memorial tiles at the National Corvette Museum. One of Alex’s skills was dealer-level car maintenance and he rebuilt the engin … | Continue reading
Instead of reading guidebooks and working my feeble brain, I let ChatGPT do the planning for our shore time in the various ports that Norwegian Joy brought us to. I cut and pasted the itinerary, said that we preferred to just walk off the ship rather than get into some other form … | Continue reading
The New York Times repeatedly informs us that we are currently facing a Climate Emergency, that our democracy is being eliminated by Donald Trump (the 2026 elections will, presumably, be suspended indefinitely; also it would be a tragedy if this #1 threat to our democracy were to … | Continue reading
Tomorrow is the big America 250 celebration. Perhaps today could be dedicated to remembering the Loyalists. A good place to start is by reading Liberty’s Exiles: American Loyalists in the Revolutionary World by Maya Jasanoff, a teacher of the Queers for Palestine (i.e., she’s at … | Continue reading
New Yorkers pride themselves on being smarter than other Americans. Now that NYC is out of electricity (Ayatollah Mamdani has instructed his subjects to set their thermostats to 78), folks are reminded that NY’s best and brightest affirmatively decided to shut down Indian Point, … | Continue reading
Tou Lue Vang, an immigrant to the U.S. from Laos, pled guilty to having sex with a 10-year-old girl. Under Minnesota law, this was apparently not a serious offence that would justify prison time, so he never went to prison and was thus free to maximize his reproductive success. M … | Continue reading
A walk through the Hoh Rain Forest, part of Olympic National Park, starts with a pool that looks like something the late great Takashi Amano might have designed (see Summer travel idea: the public aquarium in Lisbon to see the Takashi Amano show and Return trip to the world’s bes … | Continue reading
New York City (the “Mamdani Caliphate”) is not the only American city with a Socialist mayor. Katie Wilson has been running Seattle ($9 billion/year budget) for six months now. How’s socialist governance working out? It will be ironic if she does a better job than her liberal Dem … | Continue reading
Just a few more minutes of Pride and there won’t be any 2SLGBTQQIA+ holidays until Nonbinary Awareness Week begins in 13 days. Here’s a typical celebration in our neighborhood: “Congratulations to Rice-Bound Britton”. Separately, does it make sense to congratulate Bitton for c … | Continue reading
A report based on an end-of-May 2026 trip on Norwegian Joy out of Seattle. This report will cover the on-ship environment and I’ll do separate posts for the ports. We picked this particular cruise because it was one of a handful that visited Glacier Bay and that went round-trip r … | Continue reading
A lot of Democrat officials have said that the U.S. Supreme Court’s rulings are illegitimate and should not be followed, e.g., the recent ruling that allows temporarily protected Haitians to be sent home after 16 years in the U.S. Example from a Democrat thought leader: “it’s not … | Continue reading
Word games this month in the New York Times: Shake Shack, Palm Beach Gardens, promotes “Pride” and “Dubai” (Arabic-inspired script) simultaneously: Dubai follows Sharia law and, in theory, people with too much Pride could be executed, but more likely “under Article 409 of … | Continue reading
Europeans object to being mocked for their lack of air conditioning on the grounds that, pre-Climate Change, there were at most a few weeks per year when they would have wanted to use it. Note that this is partly due to European tolerance for a wider range of indoor temps than we … | Continue reading
A year ago: This month: Filter inflation rate: 40 percent. (Amazon sells some Chinese purported equivalents, but are they truly MERV 13?) The post Filterflation appeared first on Philip Greenspun’s Weblog. | Continue reading
Back in 2023 I wondered Where are the gardens and museums created by the Silicon Valley rich? That’s still a good question, in my opinion. Elon Musk is a trillionaire. In addition to voluntarily paying whatever taxes Elizabeth Warren deems fair, why hasn’t he built off-the-charts … | Continue reading
No more performative empty words for me while Europe suffers through temps over 100 degrees (in the units that God prefers). There IS a sacrifice that we Americans can make and be part of a global solution. With the help of graphic artist N. Vidia, I prepared posters and distribu … | Continue reading
My last visit to Ruby Beach and the western side of Olympic National Park was 1993 and is described in Chapter XIII of Travels with Samantha. Ruby Beach is the traditional headline attraction for this part of the park: Due to the government’s refusal to charge market prices (s … | Continue reading
I hope that everyone enjoyed the Iran v. Egypt Pride Day soccer match yesterday in Seattle. “Minneapolis City Council votes to repeal ban on adult bathhouses, sex venues” (state-sponsored public NPR): Adult bathhouses are community spaces that were historically frequented by … | Continue reading
The Trump administration has sent the U.S. military to Venezuela (“hundreds of personnel, two warships, fixed and rotary-winged aircraft, and search and rescue teams”), which will, I hope, help with immediate problems. But what about supporting long-term rebuilding of this frenem … | Continue reading
Today is the Pride Match in Seattle, which “features a globally controversial matchup between Iran and Egypt, two countries where homosexuality is heavily criminalized. Despite objections from both nations’ football associations, FIFA is permitting rainbow flags and human rights … | Continue reading
After two nights in Rainier National Park, we stopped in Olympic, Washington. The town’s passions are summarized beautifully on State Ave. Stonewall Youth, a group that hosts “drop-ins for queer+trans youth 12-21”, is surrounded by unhoused neighbors (the encampment in the photo … | Continue reading
The forecast high for today is 104 in Paris, part of the predominantly Muslim region of Europe (measured by hours spent in religious observance). It is supposed to hit 106 in Berlin on Sunday using the temperature units that God prefers: The most popular outfit for women in … | Continue reading
June is National Safety Month (also, for maximum safety from Mpox (not to be confused with “monkeypox”), Go to the Bathhouse Month). Should we protect ourselves via outdoor masking as part of our celebration? Let’s check “Does mask usage correlate with excess mortality? Findings … | Continue reading
Alan Greenspan died this week at 100. Let’s look back at Alan Greenspan Explains Modern Economics, my 2009 review of his fall 2007 book (i.e., he wrote it just as the U.S. subprime collapse was beginning). Here’s a cautionary for folks like me with portfolios that are 100% invest … | Continue reading
Established in 1899 by President McKinley, Mount Rainier National Park was the nation’s fifth. It is today surrounded by signs informing visitors, who’ll pay almost nothing to enter ($80/year for an annual pass), that they might have to wait 3 hours in a car line-up (engines and … | Continue reading
White-collar men in the 1950s often characterized their world as a “rat race”. If college-educated, they competed with only a small subset of Americans for high-paid desk jobs. Men in the 50s did not compete with immigrants because substantial importation of humans into the U.S. … | Continue reading
Here’s a chart from an X post charting answers to the question “The only acceptable religion is my religion” (perfect for Pride Month!): Iranians living in the Islamic Republic of Iran are, according to this chart, much more likely to tolerate non-Islamic belief than, for exam … | Continue reading