While I found reports of frogs apparently watching video displays, I have yet to find one of a frog standing on its hind legs. Bullfrogs apparently sometimes fight holding onto each other and standing a bit like that by leaning against each other, and you can find the odd still image in which the frog kinda appears to stand probably because the image caught it in motion at the right instant, but I have doubts frog physiology allows one to stand on its own several seconds. I kinda figure this might be an animation... Of a frog watching an animation.
I have a friend who calls me "Froggy". She explained that sometimes a frog is a prince and sometimes a frog is just a frog. "Which am I?" I asked. And thus I learned an important lesson.
I'm a big fan of court reform, but focusing on it too much leaves the destructive work of this court unaddressed. Left standing, they have already rendered decisions and precedents that will completely alter American governance.
Not least if which is their elevation of the unelected Supreme Court as the ultimate authority, above both Congress and the President. Which is why simply reversing those decisions by changing the composition of the court is insufficient. I refuse to wage a political war over WHICH unelected justices have unrestricted authority to rule the nation when the issue is that they DO have unrestricted authority to rule us.
In short, it is not just the radical conservative justices who must be neutered, but also their radical acts. In addition to altering the current court, we must do DELEGITIMIZE it.
In short, any true Reform bill must declare that the U.S. Supreme Court has been illegitimate since the 114th Congress adjourned without Constitutionally-mandated action on the nomination of Merrick Garland to the Supreme Court, and all decisions since them are null and void until reviewed by a reconstituted court.
Anything less just trades one set of black-robed rulers for another. That's a fight that we will have to wage again and again and again, and are ultimately doomed to lose, because they only need to win once.
Gee - I wonder how many MAGAts actually read "Scientific American". I suspect they would count it as "mainstream media" because it doesn't go along with their own factless beliefs
Asian elephants buried five dead calves in irrigation ditches in India, offering possible new insights into the mammals’ complex social and emotional lives, researchers report in the Journal of Threatened Taxa.
Oh FFS the name of that journal!!!!! FFS. Gah. Cry sad. Fuck.
I like the general idea of running against Trump-<other fascist who's not VP nominee>, but it should be pretty clear by now that the Biden campaign and/or DNC has decided < ... > is the Heritage Foundation's Project 2025. I mean, it's been out there for awhile now that this exists, but it's only in the past couple of weeks that it's gotten this much attention. Which is just fine. I'll never miss a chance to diss the Dems on their electoral incompetence, so I owe it to them to give props for this move.
We got attempted bait and switch on a used Subaru Outback. I noticed the last 4 of the VIN on the paperwork didn't match the VIN on the keys of the one we test drove. They got SO MAD that I caught them.
It had been about 2 hours by then, and wife stormed out and went home.
I said they had 30 minutes to finish up or I walk, and then all the big bosses came into the tiny room and started huffing and puffing. I told them our terms (using our own loan (which I had a check from our credit union for), and they said I was killing them, they just needed $2k more to close the deal.
I said no dice, I have to spend the rest of my life with my wife, she laid down the law, and I'll never see you guys again. If you don't like it, just tell me, and I'll leave right now.
They sold me the car!
I googled what they were doing, and it's a common scam. They let you drive home with the wrong car, and then call 3 days later and say there was a paper work error, and you need to swap for the right car (in my case, the other car had 20k more miles on it and was a base model vs top trim with winter package, all I cared about (heated seats). They say, oh, you can keep that car, but it's $4k extra. People usually pay the extra, since the family and friends already checked out the car and they are invested in it.
i love this so much and congrats (i also love playing the bitchy/angry/crying wife - i am an actual shakespeare actor and LIVE for live performances. esp in car dealerships or banks...)
Pretended that they were losing so much money, they never saw that many red numbers on a deal.
I also have a neighbor with a dealer license and he was watching auction sales for these cars. I knew the most expensive one sold for 15.9k at auction, nicer than this one. I paid 19.9k for it.
I told them that if they paid more than 16k for the car they were fools, and they didn't look like fools. I said they probably got it for 12-14k, so they were doing fine, and I had no sympathy.
They got kinda quiet after that.
After all that, they STILL printed out the DMV registration for the other car. Took him about 20 seconds. I called him out on it, and he said he was confused, too many numbers all over the place.
He flipped the DMV paper over and started to write some bullshit about how I, blah blah, promise to correct the VIN on the paperwork, and wrote out the whole VIN, BY HAND.
I sat back and folded my arms and said I'm not signing that bullshit, print out another one, it took 20 seconds. I'm mot leaving with the wrong VIN on the contract.
He got BIG MAD - and started pounding the key board. I got the right VIN on the paperwork.
They REALLY REALLY wanted to clear 10k on that car, and they only cleared 2-4.
If I knew the scam before I would have called my friend at the paper and got him in on the deal. They were such total brazen fuckers.
At the time these Outbacks were hard to find. I think I got a fair deal.
Hell, we put 80k miles on that car in 5 years and sold it for $13.5k. We did ok.
This story was a long and very insightful read. Never will I use financing from a dealership. Not like I could AFFORD a new car but god, what a nightmare. The fact that they won’t even give you the paperwork or the paperwork is 90 goddamn pages is just a red flag right there.
I also read a book on dealers from the 80's I think was called Don't get taken every time or something.
Most of it still applies.
Main thing to remember is just walk out. Early and often.
My next car, I'm making an appointment and telling them they have 30 min to get me out the door or no deal. Get the final price by email. I already do that, get different dealers to compete by email offers.
A debate line: You have cheated on every woman you have been with, except those you paid hush money to. But you want the American people to believe that you were faithful to your oath of office, and not Putin's whore?
Nebraska dude: "He often thinks about his friend who hauls turbine blades across the nation in a huge, fossil-fuel-burning truck and wonders what will happen to all these turbines when they inevitably wear out. “What is our carbon footprint just getting all this going?” he said. “Who is going to dig up the cement and take the turbines in 35 years?”
Answer: A lot fucking less than decommissioning a coal or gas power plant. Now you care about total environmental costs of infrastructure?
Classic "I don't wanna" with lots of whining. Funny to see all these "sir story" types concern trolling environmentalism.
Your school got a free bus from your fellow Americans. The proper response is "thank you."
What if I toad you this is your hed gif source link? https://open.substack.com/pub/martiniambassador/p/froggie-catching-up-on-ghibli
😳
Well, he does*.
*you do?
I was planning on going back to bed after walking Tater, as sinus issues kept me awake part of the night, but this kinda weirded me out, so I didn't.
If you don’t get enough sleep, you’ll feel froggy all day!
I hop not.
Toadly awesome🐸🐸🐸
like
I'll bet that frog talks like Edward G Robinson.
https://images.sr.roku.com/idType/roku/context/global/id/9a63ab4b38b758aea61dc81450173466/images/partner/files/styles/feed-240x360/public/a8wn4hw/im/a3/5f/1d5716b6c65e44b6cb4a5b916dfcd03a.jpg/magic/396x0/filters:quality(70)
https://youtu.be/FqyMpnUdmY8?t=55
Bill Barr has really let himself go.
It’s standing on two legs, I bet it has opposable thumbs, too. All hail our future toad overlords.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a1VRYXQVCpo
Let's croak us some toads.
*visits instagram*
But why didn't he give it a little military helmet? It was RIGHT THERE!
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sgt._Frog
Magnificent Tree Frogs are turning blue.
https://www.cnn.com/2024/07/11/science/tree-frog-blue-mutation-scli-intl-scn/index.html
While I found reports of frogs apparently watching video displays, I have yet to find one of a frog standing on its hind legs. Bullfrogs apparently sometimes fight holding onto each other and standing a bit like that by leaning against each other, and you can find the odd still image in which the frog kinda appears to stand probably because the image caught it in motion at the right instant, but I have doubts frog physiology allows one to stand on its own several seconds. I kinda figure this might be an animation... Of a frog watching an animation.
But this one's real!
but how does froggo stand on two legs they do not seem like they should support the glory of froggo how is froggo SO ADORABLE.
All hail Hypnotoad.
What is that electronic hum?
And a Laphroag for my wee friend, please...
ICYMI from Ziggy's non comment
The teacher bought a frog for the class, but it died before they could name it.
The tombstone said hopalong casualty.
Out.
------------------.>>
I have a friend who calls me "Froggy". She explained that sometimes a frog is a prince and sometimes a frog is just a frog. "Which am I?" I asked. And thus I learned an important lesson.
Better to be the frog… less snakes to worry about.
Nobody calls me 𝘗𝘳𝘪𝘯𝘤𝘦, the implication is clear...
The lesson: don't ask a question you don't already know the answer to.
Hurray!
I would have no problems with Stormy Daniels running the National Endowment for Art.
Yes, it was what the Russians call a meat wave--87,000 killer IRS agents. Another failed policy of the Biden crime family.
Will there be a Joe Stay or Go poll at the Wonkmeet?
I'm a big fan of court reform, but focusing on it too much leaves the destructive work of this court unaddressed. Left standing, they have already rendered decisions and precedents that will completely alter American governance.
Not least if which is their elevation of the unelected Supreme Court as the ultimate authority, above both Congress and the President. Which is why simply reversing those decisions by changing the composition of the court is insufficient. I refuse to wage a political war over WHICH unelected justices have unrestricted authority to rule the nation when the issue is that they DO have unrestricted authority to rule us.
In short, it is not just the radical conservative justices who must be neutered, but also their radical acts. In addition to altering the current court, we must do DELEGITIMIZE it.
In short, any true Reform bill must declare that the U.S. Supreme Court has been illegitimate since the 114th Congress adjourned without Constitutionally-mandated action on the nomination of Merrick Garland to the Supreme Court, and all decisions since them are null and void until reviewed by a reconstituted court.
Anything less just trades one set of black-robed rulers for another. That's a fight that we will have to wage again and again and again, and are ultimately doomed to lose, because they only need to win once.
Gee - I wonder how many MAGAts actually read "Scientific American". I suspect they would count it as "mainstream media" because it doesn't go along with their own factless beliefs
Asian elephants buried five dead calves in irrigation ditches in India, offering possible new insights into the mammals’ complex social and emotional lives, researchers report in the Journal of Threatened Taxa.
Oh FFS the name of that journal!!!!! FFS. Gah. Cry sad. Fuck.
That SciAm piece is just right on. Science, how does it work?
The glibertarian fuckhaids of Reason moan that the IRS' crackdown finances federal government activities for 90 minutes.
The IRS is just getting started on tax cheats.
I like the general idea of running against Trump-<other fascist who's not VP nominee>, but it should be pretty clear by now that the Biden campaign and/or DNC has decided < ... > is the Heritage Foundation's Project 2025. I mean, it's been out there for awhile now that this exists, but it's only in the past couple of weeks that it's gotten this much attention. Which is just fine. I'll never miss a chance to diss the Dems on their electoral incompetence, so I owe it to them to give props for this move.
That Scientific American article is the best one I have read about the current scurrilous state of the Supreme Court.
cars dealers, OMG.
We got attempted bait and switch on a used Subaru Outback. I noticed the last 4 of the VIN on the paperwork didn't match the VIN on the keys of the one we test drove. They got SO MAD that I caught them.
It had been about 2 hours by then, and wife stormed out and went home.
I said they had 30 minutes to finish up or I walk, and then all the big bosses came into the tiny room and started huffing and puffing. I told them our terms (using our own loan (which I had a check from our credit union for), and they said I was killing them, they just needed $2k more to close the deal.
I said no dice, I have to spend the rest of my life with my wife, she laid down the law, and I'll never see you guys again. If you don't like it, just tell me, and I'll leave right now.
They sold me the car!
I googled what they were doing, and it's a common scam. They let you drive home with the wrong car, and then call 3 days later and say there was a paper work error, and you need to swap for the right car (in my case, the other car had 20k more miles on it and was a base model vs top trim with winter package, all I cared about (heated seats). They say, oh, you can keep that car, but it's $4k extra. People usually pay the extra, since the family and friends already checked out the car and they are invested in it.
i love this so much and congrats (i also love playing the bitchy/angry/crying wife - i am an actual shakespeare actor and LIVE for live performances. esp in car dealerships or banks...)
oh that was the short version.
They pulled a lot of performative bullshit.
Pretended that they were losing so much money, they never saw that many red numbers on a deal.
I also have a neighbor with a dealer license and he was watching auction sales for these cars. I knew the most expensive one sold for 15.9k at auction, nicer than this one. I paid 19.9k for it.
I told them that if they paid more than 16k for the car they were fools, and they didn't look like fools. I said they probably got it for 12-14k, so they were doing fine, and I had no sympathy.
They got kinda quiet after that.
After all that, they STILL printed out the DMV registration for the other car. Took him about 20 seconds. I called him out on it, and he said he was confused, too many numbers all over the place.
He flipped the DMV paper over and started to write some bullshit about how I, blah blah, promise to correct the VIN on the paperwork, and wrote out the whole VIN, BY HAND.
I sat back and folded my arms and said I'm not signing that bullshit, print out another one, it took 20 seconds. I'm mot leaving with the wrong VIN on the contract.
He got BIG MAD - and started pounding the key board. I got the right VIN on the paperwork.
They REALLY REALLY wanted to clear 10k on that car, and they only cleared 2-4.
If I knew the scam before I would have called my friend at the paper and got him in on the deal. They were such total brazen fuckers.
At the time these Outbacks were hard to find. I think I got a fair deal.
Hell, we put 80k miles on that car in 5 years and sold it for $13.5k. We did ok.
This story was a long and very insightful read. Never will I use financing from a dealership. Not like I could AFFORD a new car but god, what a nightmare. The fact that they won’t even give you the paperwork or the paperwork is 90 goddamn pages is just a red flag right there.
Good for you for standing your ground.
I read the whole thing.
I also read a book on dealers from the 80's I think was called Don't get taken every time or something.
Most of it still applies.
Main thing to remember is just walk out. Early and often.
My next car, I'm making an appointment and telling them they have 30 min to get me out the door or no deal. Get the final price by email. I already do that, get different dealers to compete by email offers.
A debate line: You have cheated on every woman you have been with, except those you paid hush money to. But you want the American people to believe that you were faithful to your oath of office, and not Putin's whore?
Nebraska dude: "He often thinks about his friend who hauls turbine blades across the nation in a huge, fossil-fuel-burning truck and wonders what will happen to all these turbines when they inevitably wear out. “What is our carbon footprint just getting all this going?” he said. “Who is going to dig up the cement and take the turbines in 35 years?”
Answer: A lot fucking less than decommissioning a coal or gas power plant. Now you care about total environmental costs of infrastructure?
Classic "I don't wanna" with lots of whining. Funny to see all these "sir story" types concern trolling environmentalism.
Your school got a free bus from your fellow Americans. The proper response is "thank you."
My favorite fear of the electric bus: what if it gets cold and the bus won't start like our diesel buses already don't start in the cold?
Yeah, that's a problem you can only solve by connecting the bus to the charger so it can maintain battery temperature through the night.