Wednesday, October 30, 2019

Tweet of the week

I'm going to try something new. I tweet a lot more than I blog. So every week, I will post here the tweet that got the most interactions. Last weekend, I rented a Velar for a day in Orange County and posted my thoughts. Click on the tweet to see people's responses. And comment here if you wish.


Obama versus Trump speech styles

Now you know I don't often (if ever) post photos or videos of our current president. But this is pretty funny.

I have a kidney stone

During the power outage, at three in the morning, I woke up with the worst pain in my life. I have a kidney stone. I'm going to wait for it to pass. But if it doesn't, the doctor will pulverize it with soundwaves(!).


Sunday, October 20, 2019

Cool 8 minute piece about Chukotka

Economist article about Russia's Chukotka

Though I don't agree with the politics of The Economist, I do enjoy its stories about faraway places. Like this story. Chukotka is about as remote as it gets.

AOC endorses Bernie

AOC is the new voice of The Left. It's incredible to think that in May 2018, nobody had heard of her. This was her campaign ad to unseat an incumbent, out-of-touch, Democrat:


Yesterday, AOC endorsed Bernie in front of a record crowd (for this election cycle so far):

The evolution of Taco Bell hot sauce packets


Tuesday, October 15, 2019

Wednesday, October 09, 2019

Food tour: Lhasa under Chinese rule

Recently, I've been watching Mark Wiens eat his way around the world. He just visited Lhasa, under Chinese government supervision. I've never seen footage like this before. It's quite disconcerting to see a fully loaded Range Rover in front of the Potala Palace. And every store sign has Chinese words and red flags. I think it's safe to say the Tibetan spirit has been completely broken.

i3 being charged by a Honda generator

As you may know by now, we are going through some pre-emptive power shutdowns. This tweet is making the rounds, and it's actually from 2014 in LA. H/t to Dogs!



Sunday, October 06, 2019

Tristan da Cunha's Inaccessible Island

I was reading an article about plastic garbage and came upon a place called Inaccessible Island. It's a part of Tristan da Cunha.

Here is the island:

Here is Tristan da Cunha:

Foreign troops marching in China's 70th National Day parade

The list of countries is telling. The leaders who showed up is telling. And Xi pressured a lot of them to wear goofy baseball caps.



Afghanistan
Belarus
Cambodia
Cuba: The new leader looks so modern and young compared to the Castro brothers.
Egypt: Sisi showed up.
Fiji
Kazakhstan: Nazarbayev showed up. I thought he retired.
Kyrgyzstan
Laos: The first lady has Imelda Marcos sunglasses.
Mexico: So neutral.
Mongolia: No mounted archers.
Pakistan
Serbia: Remember when NATO "accidentally" bombed the Chinese embassy in Belgrade?
Tajikistan
Vanuatu: !
Venezuela: Maduro dared to leave his country.
Russia: But Russia is not last alphabetically.

1982 Seiko TV watch


Wednesday, October 02, 2019

Tuesday, October 01, 2019

Hongqi speeding on the freeway

This is supposedly the model that carried Xi during the China National Day parade yesterday. H/t SanchezF40 and Ramon.