Re. the latest Platner news, people are always saying to me, “Michael, I bet it feels great being right all the time.” But to quote Holly Hunter…

Early Live Performance by Talking Heads (1976). This “must-watch” 90-minute show is more than a year before their first album and includes songs like Psycho Killer, Thank You For Sending Me An Angel, and Love → Building On Fire. [kottke.org]

God this is all we need. No one tell RFK Jr, he’s already trying to bring back miasma theory.

when google maps is giving you directions but you’re still in your neighborhood

No worse crime in America these days than being insufficiently deferential to the boot on your neck.

𝐖𝐂 𝟐𝟔 𝐆𝐑𝐎𝐔𝐏 𝐀 𝐏𝐑𝐄𝐕𝐈𝐄𝐖 - Mexico, South Africa, South Korea & Czechia! 🇲🇽 🇿🇦 🇰🇷 🇨🇿 - Story of the team 📕 - Manager & tactics 🧠 - Key players 🤩 - Very Specific Predictions 🔮 🍎: tinyurl.com/ykadst28 ✳️: tinyurl.com/4fryj3yd 📺: tinyurl.com/yc3zakzc

If you want to waste some time this morning, this is more fun than scrolling. Looks like there’s a good chance of France v Germany in the round of sixteen. It occurs to me we haven’t seen a French implosion in a while. We might be due.

All my He-Man stuff is probably still in my parents’ basement. I was the perfect age for this movie and so excited, and then I was so disappointed. Back then I didn’t know anything about budgets or studios, I just knew I didn’t want to see He-Man in suburban California.

That was pretty good! Offense looked more cohesive and efficient than it has in a while. I’d really like to see Zendejas with Pulisic. Midfield still looks too easy to play through, but I’m more confident about them playing against a low block like Paraguay now.

“The white whale! The whiiiiiiite wh … no, no … my mistake! … A black whale! A regular, blaaaaaack whale!”

To take this one step further, if it came out today and was still set 17 years in the past, you could soundtrack the opening credits with I Gotta Feeling by the Black Eyed Peas. Time moves inexorably and crushingly forward.

Sure this seems awful and soul destroying but we all fondly remember the part in Pride and Prejudice where Darcy is frame mogging at the ball only for Elizabeth Bennet to come in and spike his cortisol.

Somewhere in Dayton, Robert Pollard is snapping a pencil in half.

Trump’s had one motto which he’s always lived by…

Gotta say, I appreciate that on one app I can cultivate a feed that treats this as the titanic loss that it is. People posting photos, videos, album recommendations. This is what I want from social media, not an algorithm.

Always good to read David Blight, especially on the first Memorial Day.

It was kinda confusing as a kid to learn Frank Capa who famously documented WWII had nothing to do with Frank Capra who also famously documented WWII. See also H.G. Wells who did War of the Worlds, not to be confused with Orson Welles who also did War of the Worlds. Ingrid and Ingmar Bergman too.

Woke up with a killer headache today and I’m trying to convince myself it’s from the nearby wildfire and not the chemical spill in Orange County. Either way I’m about an hour away from attempting some at home trepanation.

A fun game is to imagine if any previous USMNT coach named this roster and the corresponding reaction from fans.

Mato Tipila, 5/22/2026, 9:58:26 PM

Colbert had Macca, Letterman signed off with Foo Fighters playing Everlong. Who would you get to play your final “goodnight and good luck”? And what song are they playing? Stevie Wonder is the free space

Will always appreciate Stephen Colbert who I first came across on Strangers With Candy doing deranged hilarious comedy…

I’m just saying… “Hey buddy, sorry I missed your ball game, I got tied up at work again. But I promise I’ll be there next week. I mean it this time.”

Welp!

The winner on Jeopardy tonight looks like the dad in an early 90s kids movie who’s always on his brick of a cellphone and is too busy to play with his son. Don’t worry, they’ll all learn important lessons by the end.

Of course they are. Sure, why not?

May 20 is way too early for the Watch Duty map to be looking like this. June Gloom can’t come soon enough or it’s gonna be a rough summer.

There’s a lot of things I’m really worried about in this political moment, but JD ain’t one of them. Everything he says and does is just sweaty.

Mount Saint Helens erupted on this day 46 years ago. John "Jack" V. Christianson took these photos from Mt. Adams, 54 km to the east, as his friend reacted to the eruption—really, the wholesale collapse of the volcano—at 8:32 am on 18 May 1980. Imagine what this must have been like to witness.

Just read a great book about Sister Aimee and what a fascinating story. A good reminder that not much is really new, people have always been messy.

Emergency beach day

Just finished the British mid century novella WHO WAS CHANGED AND WHO WAS DEAD by Barbara Comyns. Best description I have is it’s like if Cold Comfort Farm was written by Shirley Jackson, eccentric but dark with a ruthlessness that cuts through the comedy.

I have some surprisingly fond memories of Schlitz. In college one time we threw a “Beers Of Milwaukee” party, Schlitz, PBR, Miller, Blatz, Old Milwaukee, etc to try to class up the fact we were just buying the cheapest beers at Kroger. Don’t think we fooled anyone.

Pittsburgh Zoo’s GM…

Started reading through this playlist and was immediately transported to the rear facing back seat of my best friend’s parents’ station wagon. Wow

Genuinely, this might be the pinnacle of American culture. Public educational children’s television and Stevie is the culmination of decades if not centuries of American music tradition. We’re capable of great things when we want to be.

It’s Stevie Wonder’s birthday. Here he is tearing the roof off Sesame Street back in 1973. Television might have peaked in this moment.

A thread of stuff I’ve been enjoying lately… Small Prophets- Mackenzie Crooks’ Detectorists is one of my favorite shows, and I really like his new one for a lot of the same reasons. He’s a careful observer of the little moments in life and sprinkles in a bit of magic here and there.

Solid start for the day www.maptap.gg May 12 99🎯 98🎯 98🎯 98🔥 95🏆 Final score: 972

Slightly increase a band Much Better Than Ezra

We prioritized taking the kids to museums and exposing them to older books, movies, and shows and all kinds of music at an early age. Not in the hope that it would make them baby geniuses, but so they’d grow up thinking it was all normal to do. Curiosity needs to be nourished.

I pity the fool who doesn’t treat their mother right

Happy 100th to David Attenborough. He’s given the world so much, including being the inspiration for one of my all time favorite tweets.

There are 61 candidates on the ballot for California governor. That’s too many, but at least we get some guys like Freddy here. I guarantee you’ll never be able to guess what his next position will be from his last. It’s a journey.

An MLS team not capitalizing on early chances against a LIGA MX side only for it to come back to haunt them?

Well I’m sure there’s at least some good deals to be had since these hotels are so desperate… $412 for a Courtyard by Marriott?!

Happy Birthday Orson “Our songs will all be silenced - but what of it? Go on singing.”