Len Testa writes, “Back in the early 1960’s, Walt was interested in buying and developing the Mineral King ski area in California, which was being put up for sale by the U.S. government. Another potential bidder on the project was industrialist Robert Brandt, husband of Hollywood actress Janet Leigh.”
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Mattthew Luckhurst, a 5-year veteran of San Antionio Police Department, was fired after feeding shit to a homeless person. Josh Baugh reports that he “placed fecal matter between two pieces of bread” and placed it in a styrofoam container next to his victim. It’s not clear if they ate it.
“This was a vile and disgusting act that violates our guiding principles of ‘treating all with integrity, compassion, fairness and respect,’ Chief William McManus said in a prepared statement. “The fact that his fellow officers were so disgusted with his actions that they reported him to Internal Affairs demonstrates that this type of behavior will never be tolerated. The action of this one former officer in no way reflects the actions of all the other good men and women who respectfully serve this community.”
Even the police union has ditched him: “He’s on his own right now,” said Mike Helle, president of the San Antonio Police Officers Association.
Copyright trolls like LA-based CEG TEK are exploiting Canada’s “notice-and-notice” copyright system to force ISPs to pass on extortion letters to their customers, threatening them with dire consequences unless they pay hundreds of dollars to settle unsubstantiated accusations of copyright infringement.
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When I bake these chocolate gingerbread cookies, the entire kitchen smells of wintry spices. It’s impossible not to feel like the holidays have arrived.
Deep dark chocolate and fresh grated ginger sets these cookies apart from the other cookies on the holiday cookie plate.
I have spent a lot of time running a bar of wax over my Belstaff jacket. No longer, now I use spray on Nikwax.
Every now and then my waxed cotton jacket needs a touch up. Nikwax is about 1000x easier to use than a solid or cream wax. You liberally spray this on, rub it in and let it dry. I find it has a pleasant, not noxious scent.
There are two colors: green and neutral. Make sure you check the label, although green will work fine on black. It is a very light tint and won’t show through, at least on my ancient jacket.
California’s recent rains show this stuff not only goes on easy, but works well.
Nikwax Wax Cotton Proof via Amazon
Ships in the Arctic Ocean report that an odd pinging sound emanating from the bottom of the sea can be heard through their hulls. The Canadian military, fortified with Scooby snacks, is on the case.
From The Guardian:
Several reports were passed to the military, which sent a CP-140 Aurora patrol aircraft to investigate on Tuesday under the mandate of Operation Limpid, a domestic surveillance programme designed to “detect, deter, prevent, pre-empt and defeat threats aimed at Canada or Canadian interests”.
In a statement, Department of National Defence spokeswoman Ashley Lemire said: “The Canadian armed forces are aware of allegations of unusual sounds emanating from the seabed in the Fury and Hecla Strait in Nunavut. The air crew performed various multi-sensor searches in the area, including an acoustic search for 1.5 hours, without detecting any acoustic anomalies. The crew did not detect any surface or subsurface contacts.
There are a lot of solar chargers out there, but the Water-Resistant Dual-USB Solar Charger is one of the best deals I’ve seen. It’s much more compact than your typical solar chargers, which tend to be very brick-like. And yet it still packs an impressive 5000mAh of power.
The charger itself can be powered via solar energy or USB depending on where you find yourself needing it. From there, you can charge any two USB-compatible devices simultaneously with its dual high-speed 2.1A outputs.
The best feature is that this charger is water and dust resistant, so you can truly take advantage of solar power outdoors without worrying about it breaking.
If you’ve been looking for a solar charger, this one comes at a great discount. The Water-Resistant Dual-USB Solar Charger is just $19.99 in the Boing Boing Store.
An imminently forthcoming version of Google’s Chrome browser will flip the way that browsers convey information about privacy and security to users: instead of discreetly informing users that the HTTPS-enabled sites they’re browsing are more secure, they’ll flag any non-HTTPS site as insecure, with a series of escalating alerts that will end — at some unspecified date — by displaying an exclamation point inside red triangle and the letters HTTP next to the web addresses of non-HTTPS sites.
Rebecca Solnit (previously), one of my favorite writers, has published an open letter to Donald Trump, “New York City Is a Book Conservatives Should Read,” which celebrates the city’s teeming, messy, multicultural vigor — something she delves into deeply with Nonstop Metropolis: A New York City Atlas, a book about the “innumerable unbound experiences of New York City [with] twenty-six imaginative maps and informative essays” (just ordered mine).
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Throughout the election cycle, The GOP Arcade has been releasing satirical 8-bit games about the GOP and right-wing politics in America; the New York Times commissioned a special one, based on the classic Oregon Trail, in which you play one of three voters attempting to cast a vote in either Texas (where you are a Latina nurse); Wisconsin (where you are a black salesman) or California (where you are a white programmer).
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Daniel Dale is the Washington Bureau Chief for the Toronto Star; for the duration of the campaign, he’s been compiling daily lists of Trump’s lies: now, with the election days away, the Star has put these together in one gigantic list, with citations refuting each of Trump’s whoppers.
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From the Wall Street Journal tonight, just a few days from the presidential election on Tuesday, a sleaze exposé involving the GOP Presidential nominee Donald Trump.
