I still remember stocking hand sanitizer and black nitrile gloves in my retail stores, late February 2020. That was us getting ready.

Jump to the second week of March and California announcing a stay-at-home order. I had to go secure our stores for being unoccupied. On the way there is was dozens of miles of empty LA freeways, and news radio all about people suffocating on ventilators and sanitizing everything that came into your house. Then, walking alone through empty malls, avoiding anyone else who was there. It felt like we were shutting down the for good.

Sorry my man I replied wrong :/

drown myself in sleep

That is quite literally the goal of so many friends in my life. In between work, kids, holidays, yard work, vacuuming, groceries, and then more hours at work…it’s a treat that makes that long laundry list of a life manageable.

Make plans to sleep regularly. You won’t regret it.

Edit: I can’t reply on the internet

More evidence that there’s a black hole of shit calling itself Donald Trump, and absolutely nobody who has been pulled into his orbit cares about this, or even allegations that he raped little girls.

The thing we’re missing here is that while normal, well-adjusted, educated people who recognize the alarm bells of an elected official publishing gaffs and mistakes like these, the MAGA base frequently makes and overlooks these kinds of mistakes, overlooking them as inconsequential. We all do shit, but none of it matters if it’s done with charisma.

It’s like when a Gen-Z college intern reads an email from a Gen-X, C-Level boss that’s riddled with possessive apostrophes and misspellings and he wonders how someone who never achieved a commensurate literacy is promoted into that role. But it’s not a deal-breaker because his network of peers and competitive, extroverted personality are thought to keep the business thriving.

Jump ahead to a thriving workplace where the hardworking hourly employees show up everyday.

Jump to a Master’s graduate who vibe-authored all of his papers and never had to deal with minutia like punctuation in his resume.

Jump to a charismatic personality.

People can overlook a lot when they want you on their team.

How this fellow sounds is forlorn. How he sounds is angry. How he sounds is like he’s figured out just how easy it is to live backstage and out of costume.

The thing is, he’s not the only one. At some point, with some other person in the world, how you behave stops being an act. A “performance,” as he says. Maybe it’s the friend with whom you grew up tabletop gaming, overeating Cheetos and not caring when the Mountain Dew stayed in your facial hair just otter too long.

Maybe it’s the girl with whom you can share a blanket on the couch, and twist your legs into some sort of hot vine, each of you staring into your phone like a completely normal person.

Whoever it is, they’re with you. Backstage. Out of character. Not chewing on the scenery for the audience.

This guy never found that person.

Every headline aiming to justify Jonathan Ross’ shot into the car obfuscates the fact that deliberately placed himself in front of her vehicle.

Headlines like this get us talking about exactly what they want us to talk about: whether or not Jonathan Ross was struck by a vehicle.

What we’re not supposed to talk about is why Jonathan Ross created the opportunity to be struck, or what led to him being struck and dragged by another vehicle six months ago.

In 2014 DHS published an internal audit report stating that on dozens of occasions their officers would intentionally stand in the path of vehicles to fraudulently justify use of force in shooting the drivers out of “frustration.”

It was such an issue that DHS had to issue an entirely new handbook and guidance explicitly training their agents not to stand in front of cars on purpose.

They have tons of instances of their officers intentionally blocking a vehicle for the sole purpose of then firing at it - and their policy is officially that their agents should never do that.

https://www.npr.org/sections/thetwo-way/2014/05/31/317645125/border-patrol-releases-new-use-of-force-guidelines-critical-report

From the document: "It should be recognized that a 1/2 ounce (200 grain) bullet is unlikely to stop a 4,000 pound moving vehicle, and if the driver of the approaching vehicle is disabled by a bullet, the vehicle will become a totally unguided threat.

Obviously, shooting at a moving vehicle can pose a risk to bystanders including other agents."

There is little doubt that the safest course for an agent faced with an oncoming vehicle is to get out of the way of the vehicle."

The actual handbook is available here: https://imlive.s3.amazonaws.com/Federal Government/ID255426897069329047495080324203699905714/2.2.1_Attachment 21 - ICE Firearms and Use of Force Directive and Handbook.pdf

Page 12 includes the following:

4. Deadly force is not authorized solely to prevent the escape of a fleeing suspect.

Deadly force against a fleeing subject is only authorized if there is probable cause to believe that the escape of the suspect would pose an imminent danger of death or serious bodily injury to the officer or another person.

The 2013 report is here: https://www.cbp.gov/sites/default/files/documents/PERFReport.pdf

As an elder Millenial I still can’t wrap my brain around the fact that the high school grads I employ grew up post-YouTube and have been relying on LLMs for four years

In the past, say, dozen years, the way in which we consume media has become niche, and corridored straight to us.

Back in 1996, you graduated in a year when everyone would have seen the same yada-yada bit on Seinfeld and then talked about it the next day.

In 2026, what we see are our own narrowed corridors of media, brought to us twofold by the algorithm and the ease with which we can navigate to exactly what interests us.

Sometimes it feels good to find your place until…until you realize it’s isolating.