A bigger beach

Lake Michigan water levels drop to lowest in years amid warmth and lack of rain

“It’s a complicated picture,” said Lauren Fry, a scientist with the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration Great Lakes Environmental Research Laboratory.

One complication (not suggested in the photo here) is that Lake Michigan's not just Chicago — it's also a whole lot of Wisconsin and Michigan. Another is, it's a Great Lake that actually has sandy beaches, unlike some others I could name.

A bigger beach is good.

Likes Twinkies but won't eat dogs

Omnivore, Intermittent Faster, Reformed Twinkie Lover: the R.F.K. Jr. Diet

He likes to talk about vitamins and has been known to post videos of himself lifting weights, shirtless. He has also been linked to a lot of dead animals, so the question seems like fair game, so to speak. 

NYTimes ("All the News That's Fit to Print,' even just barely) fearlessly investigates ("conversations with people familiar with his eating habits") Kennedy's plate.

Also from this morning's Times…

How Do I Decide What Socks to Wear?

“We are pünktlich people"

Germany Got a Chance to Show It Rules the World of Forklift Racing. It Didn’t Go Well.

Germans have long sat comfortably atop the world of competitive forklift driving, a point of national pride. There are songs, tattoos and fully functioning kid’s models dedicated to the humble industrial vehicle. The best drivers are treated like rockstars.

 

Outdoing the French

We Can’t Give Up Paper Checks, and That’s a Gold Mine for Scammers

The scammers have found a particularly American security hole: our reliance on paper checks. On average, there were some 30 checks per person written in the U.S. in 2021, nearly twice as many as the French, the world’s second-biggest check users, according to the Federal Reserve. In many European countries, electronic payment networks have completely replaced paper checks.

I am so old I personally know some people like this, people who consider financial transactions online unsafe. Or incomprehensibly modern, perhaps. And so they prefer to write checks. And receive checks. Which is the only reason I write checks myself. 

So, for the record, I am not (yet) like the rest of Europe.

Will polution save us (or them)?

Chicago-area water pollution may be stalling the spread of invasive carp

Among the suspects: volatile organic compounds and substances not removed by wastewater treatment plants, such as pharmaceuticals.

Maybe there really is a silver lining in everything — unless you're a silver carp. 

"Leave without moving"

The Rural Areas Pushing for Divorce From Democratic Cities

“I’m so flipping excited,” said Paul Preston, founder of New California State, which has declared all the counties outside of Los Angeles, the Bay Area and Sacramento as independent and named him governor pro tempore.

 And welcome to "New Illinois."

“The idea that someplace in Illinois wants to kick out another place in Illinois should not be on the ballot,” said Democratic Illinois Gov. JB Pritzker in a news briefing before the election.

History and, well, the Constitution seem to agree.

OK, I'll bite. (Will you?)

How a viral, duct-taped banana came to be worth $1 million

“What you buy when you buy Cattelan’s ‘Comedian’ is not the banana itself, but a certificate of authenticity that grants the owner the permission and authority to reproduce this banana and duct tape on their wall as an original artwork by Maurizio Cattelan,” Galperin said.

Wait. Let's review.

You provide your own wall, your own tape, and your own banana, and then you pay $1 million for permission to tape the banana to the wall and call it art.

Of course after not-many-days the banana will turn to mush and then do you have to pay another million to tape another banana to the wall? Do you have to use the same tape? Can you use the same wall?

Can you still call it art?

What about, say, a grapefruit?

It's nukes

Illinois nuclear plants are in the crosshairs of data centers and AI’s insatiable demand for clean power.

On Tuesday, President Joe Biden’s administration unveiled plans to triple the nation’s nuclear power supply by midcentury. While support for most clean energy projects is threatened by Republican control of Washington, this one might stick. A Pew Research poll from August shows Republicans are more likely than Democrats to favor expanding nuclear power generation.

Burgeoning demand for electricity to power computer centers, the automotive fleet, other endeavors make nuclear power a "green" necessity.

Currently, Illinois produces substantially more nuclear power than any other U.S. state.

"Just short of obnoxious"

Inside Hollywood’s Big ‘Wicked’ Gamble

Soon it will be impossible for anyone to escape. Amazon is programming its Alexa devices to answer queries in the voice of Elphaba or Glinda. The film’s costume designer created a line of cardigans, skirts and other apparel for Target, which has already seen increased foot traffic in stores since some merchandise hit shelves. The Green Elixir, a combination of cold brew, peppermint syrup, matcha cream cold foam and candy sprinkles, is one of two new Starbucks drinks themed to the movie’s release—a first for the chain.

As the definition of "just short" becomes vanishing small.

You will need to reserve time for your fake wish

Tourists toss coins over a makeshift pool as Rome’s Trevi Fountain undergoes maintenance

To manage the overwhelming number of tourists visiting the fountain, Rome City officials are devising a plan to block off the area around the fountain. Visitors will be required to book online and then pay a fee of 2 euros ($2.20) to get in. Once inside, they will have 30 minutes to enjoy the fountain.

In normal times, when the wishes are presumably real, the fountain nets an estimated 1.5 million euros ($1.6 million) per year.

The autopsy continues

The New Driving Force of Identity Politics Is Class, Not Race

Thirty years ago, Americans with a college degree accounted for roughly 20% of the population and held the same percentage of household wealth as those without a degree, according to the census and the Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis. Today, Americans with a college degree account for 38% of the population and 73% of household wealth.

Everywhere: What went wrong?

This take from the Wall Street Journal seems pretty much on target to me.

Still not too late

Florida museum attempting paper rocket world record

"For the purposes of the record, a paper rocket is defined as a toy made entirely of paper that fits onto a straw, and when the straw is blown through, the rocket flies into the air," the science center said in a news release.

It's Saturday the 16th. Hustle on down to Orlando. Don't forget the straw.

When you go off the tracks before you even leave the station

Rubio, Gabbard, and Gaetz. . . Oh My!

Rubio, Little Marco, has some credentials at least; Gabbard I could live with as head of the VA maybe — but DNI? And Gaetz? Well.

Here's AI's summary:

Gaetz’s appointment has raised concerns among conservative legal scholars and former White House officials.

Didn't take much I for that. 

By the way, DNI (Director of National Intelligence) oversees the activities of 18 US intelligence agencies. Here they are.

Another kind of gold rush

A Drug Gang Stole 3 Tons of Gold in a Scam So Perfect It’s Still Going

Over the past four years, illegal miners have built an underground network so vast that Zijin engineers said the mountain has started to resemble Swiss cheese, crisscrossed with makeshift passageways and tunnels leading from an estimated 380 aboveground entryways. The Gulf Clan provides bunks, kitchens, bathrooms and security

You don't have to wait…

 …until your kid goes to Harvard ($50,000+/yr) to start shelling out in Massachusetts.

A child care center in Massachusetts costs an average of $19,961 annually for a toddler, and family- or home-based care costs $13,344, according to a 2023 report from the Annie E. Casey Foundation. Both were the highest of any state in the US.

Sez this story in the Boston Globe.

And where is Robin Hood when you need him?

Too many wild deer are roaming England’s forests. Can promoting venison to consumers help?

There are now more deer in England than at any other time in the last 1,000 years, according to the Forestry Commission, the government department looking after England’s public woodland.

[The outlaw Robin Hood and his men lived in Sherwood Forest. They had no other means of getting food, and so they illegally poached the king’s deer. The hunting skill of Robin Hood and his band, however, enabled them to poach deer without being apprehended. – encyclopedia.com]

Sizzle yourself to sleep

KFC and Hatch unveil frying chicken audio to help people sleep

"When we kept seeing social media posts about the similarity between frying chicken and rain, we decided to make the absolute best version of that audio" said Eric Pallotta, CMO at Hatch.

And so the idea was hatched (get it?)

Hatch is the company that makes the fairly pricey gadget that plays the sound, and if you play it all night you will wake up starving in the morning. At least I would.

[H/T Lynn C Dot]