Posts tagged “Rome”

• The death of Brigitte Bardot, 1960s sex symbol turned militant animal rights activist, means there are now only three people mentioned in the 1989 Billy Joel song We Didn’t Start the Fire who are still alive: Chubby Checker, Bob Dylan, and… Bernie Goetz. – via Simon Kuestenmacher
• There’s really no way to explain to anyone under the age of about forty what a big deal MTV was when it launched. It’s not at all surprising — I haven’t watched in at least twenty years — but it’s still a bit sad to learn they’re shutting down all music-only channels as of December 31.
• Also nostalgic: The HTML Elements Time Forgot
• Prepare to waste some time playing the Top 10 Free Browser Games of 2025.
• Rome just unveiled two new subway stops that transform its metro into a museum experience. – via Ciao Bella
• Astronomers using the James Webb Space Telescope have discovered a runaway supermassive black hole ten million times larger than the sun, rocketing through space at 2.2 million miles per hour.
• I had no idea there was a sequel to one of my favorite SNL sketches.
• “That first post-game sacrifice only aired online, but the explosion was immediate.”
• A new study suggests moderate fitness appears to act like an insurance policy against alcohol’s long-term negative health effects. – via Arnold’s Pump Club
• It’s hard to believe that Steven Spielberg has made only four studio films about aliens, primarily because his first two were so incredible. Disclosure Day, coming in 2026, will be his fifth.
• “If you want a job in the moisturizer industry, the best advice I can give is to apply daily.” – via Cassidy Williams
• Not securing domain names before announcing something idiotic has been a perpetual epic failure of the current administration.

• When ancient Romans felt wronged, they didn’t ask for revenge from the gods. Instead they scratched their anger into thin lead sheets called defixiones, folded them carefully, and buried them in wells, graves, or temples, trusting that some power beneath the earth would take care of the rest.
• Buckle up, buttercup. This essay is going to be tough to swallow. Collagen Sits on a Throne of Lies: How the supplement industry took meat garbage and turned it into a $9B business
• A single HPV vaccination appears just as effective as two doses at preventing the viral infection that causes cervical cancer.
• Finding it impossible to stop thinking about The Chair Company? You can get a Tecca t-shirt or hat, but they’re sold out of chairs.
• One of the hardest parts of being a parent is attempting to balance, “Please study! School and your grades are very important,” with, “Don’t be stressed! This one history test isn’t going to matter at all in twenty years.” – via me
• Have you ever wondered how a touch screen knows you are touching it?
• Chindōgu: The Japanese Art of Unuseless Inventions
• How a UF engineer found purpose Below Deck
• Man unexpectedly cured of HIV after stem cell transplant
• “Anyone who was born an American and therefore feels superior to someone who had to work to become an American doesn’t know the first thing about being an American.” – via @harrymccracken.com
• Good News for People Who Like Bad News:
  • A 6-year-old boy is missing after ICE arrested him and his dad in NYC last week and shipped them to separate facilities. – via @clauirizarry
  • Zillow has removed climate risk scores from over a million real estate listings after realtors complained that information such as how at risk a home is from wildfires was causing them to lose sales. – via @carnage4life
  • Crucial is shutting down — because Micron wants to sell its RAM and SSDs to AI companies instead. – via @papapishu
  • “You are an abuser of women — that is the ugly truth and I have no respect for any man that belittles, lies, cheats, sleeps around, and uses women for his own power and ego.” – Penelope Hegseth to her son, Pete
  • The Supreme Court is siding with the current administration 84 percent of the time; it sided with the Biden administration only 53 percent of the time. And of course only one of those administrations is habitually laying waste to the rule of law.
  • Lawsuits allege USA Gymnastics, SafeSport failed to prevent sexual abuse by coach

• The Falconer time travel sketch is genius, and I can’t believe it took me almost twenty years to see it.
• Space Pants is almost as good. (Check out its Reddit thread and backstory, too.)
• Ballad of a Thin Man has always reminded me of The Second Coming. It’s more than a little disturbing that they’re equally relevant these days. – via my dad
• The Roman Empire’s original smartwatch: portable sundials
• I have been using Dotster as my registrar for this site for more than 25 years. I was a little miffed to learn last year that they were acquired by Web.com, but didn’t think much of it because my site’s registration is paid far in advance and I rarely think about it. Today I got an email telling me that Web.com was acquired by Network Solutions, and I cannot stand their platform. Most of my 50+ domains are registered at Dreamhost, so I’ll likely be switching soon.
• Mere anarchy is loosed upon the world:
  • “The last ship from China will dock at a West coast port on the 29th, and the last Chinese ship will dock on the East coast around May 10th. […] We’re screwed.“
  • [Current] administration officials are placing dozens of posters of arrested unauthorized immigrants along the White House driveway.
  • POTUS pardons Nevada politician who paid for cosmetic surgery with funds to honor a slain officer.
  • A little-known firm with investors linked to JD Vance, Elon Musk, and POTUS could get a piece of the federal expense card system — and its hundreds of millions in fees.
  • Republicans are trying to steal an election in North Carolina.
  • Please understand that when 2A cultists point their fingers at bizarre tragedies – like what happened recently in Vancouver – as some sort of justification for their infantile predilection for firearms, an excruciatingly rational response is that the entire automobile industrial complex is also misguided, cancerous, and evil.

• I created a Bluesky account back in April, but then fell into Threads. I think I’m going to try using the former more than the latter. I very much appreciate that you can get verified there without paying for it, and their verification process is excellent.
• Whether he’s writing a television pilot, a comic book, or one of the greatest superhero movies of all time, Sam Hamm always has Virginia basketball on the brain. I loved this story about the Batman writer who hides UVA basketball Easter eggs in his work. – via David Betancourt @ The Athletic
• After a Montana man illegally cloned and bred an endangered giant sheep species, government agencies must now contend with the illicit offspring.
• I’m very happy to report that my cocktail guide iOS app, bartender.live, is still chugging along. If you’re a fan, please leave a review and/or spread the word. (Thanks!)
• The Miraculous Resurrection of Notre-Dame: This is the story of how an army of artisans turned back centuries to restore the crown jewel of France by hand, and wound up reviving something even greater than the cathedral itself. – via Curious About Everything
• Ok, NOW I’m thinking a lot about the fall of the Roman Empire. – via @chrisjbrinkman
• “Billionaires” puts the focus on an arbitrary number. Bring back “robber barons,” or at the very least, “tycoons” – via @king_mattking

“They’re espadrilles but they’re flat,” my wife said to me in Rome with the same mistaken confidence it would be understood as if I’d remarked to her that Chamberlain should never have been fooled by the Stresa Conference and appeasement was always destined to fail.