I love this run-down of Magic: The Gathering over on Defector. It is remarkably prescient for me because my son is starting to get into Magic. We have been purchasing older physical decks ( think decks from sets about 5-7 years ago ) for cheaper just to play around and for him to learn the game.

I started playing right after Beta ( and I stupidly sold all my cards circa '95-'96 ); I played off and on throughout the years and then picked up Magic the Gathering in its first digital offering Maigc The Gathering Online and played that around from around '05-'07. It was fun, but it felt constrained by some of the rules. The game was probably better than the games that followed it for actual deckbuilding and trading/buying other cards with actual players, but it ended up becoming infused with bots and such that made it tough to tell a friend, hey, install this tonight, and maybe we can play some. It was a big hurdle to get going.

Then, a second digital iteration came out around 2014 called Duel of the Planeswalkers had been paired down to a perfect offering for someone my age who didn't want to put a ton of money into the physical cards but loved the lore of the game and the ability to get some quick games in with some premade decks. It was also one the first time a MTG game had been available on Xbox. You could earn pretty substantial cards to play with just by doing the storyline, and I believe this is what struck gold with the "I-don't-want-to-keep-up-with-the-meta" players like myself who don't have the time for the deck creation and acquisition in the tangible playing world.

As of the last few years we have had MTG: Arena, which is the one mentioned with this quote in the article:

“They don't owe me anything, but you could just consciously feel that they were trying to cut you up. They wanted people to stop playing in stores, to tank Standard, and for people to play on Arena.” Hobby Store Owner on M:TG

One of the things this article really set out to describe is Garfield feeling like this is what the game is missing now. I definitely don't blame him, but it is a bit more accessible now.

Arena is a solid title, and I enjoy the storylines they learned from on Duel of the Planeswalkers. Cards are easy to come by, primarily if you work yourself up on the single player.

Again, though I don't keep up to date with the latest decks ( it looks like some cowboy-themed update just came out!), I do enjoy the core of the gameplay. I am glad that my son and I are able to grab some $20 pauper decks and have a good time playing at the kitchen table. I liked how Garfield would take common card decks to shops/conventions to show people you don't need expensive cards.

I first heard of people doing this about a decade ago and just now started trying it during COVID-19. I never had a problem pollinating tomatoes in my garden before, but I am now a huge convert to this method because the yield is much bigger.

All you are doing is emulating buzz pollination for the flower's anthers using an electric toothbrush. It all sounds a slightly kinky, but damn if it doesn't work well. You touch the back of the toothbrush ( while on, of course ) to the back of the tomato flower.

I usually wait until they are well in bloom before I do it. I am growing Hybrid 100s this year and they produce a ton of small tomatoes, so each branch that I am working with contains a good half-dozen+ of tomatoes.

This is a super cheap method for a greater yield. I don't have a ton of room for tomatoes, so every little bit helps.

I love MLS, but I have never really watched European soccer. We started watching Wrexham right when it came out and have been big fans watching them assail through the leagues they are in, but I have never really investigated the Premier League or taken a liking to any of the teams. Until this weekend, Manchester United was playing Coventry City, and Manchester United was supposed to walk away with this one; they were up 3-0 in the first half, but Coventry came back, and a shell-shocked Manchester United had to go into penalty kicks to decide the game.

Coventry City ultimately lost, but you could tell Manchester was walking off the pitch knowing they could have been beaten. The weird thing was, you could almost see Coventry celebrating that they were so close to taking down Manchester United ( and their budget ). It was a pretty cool game, and I have to say I am now a fan of Coventry City.

I missed my calling in life. This is great and this guy was so ahead of the game.

[🏴‍☠️] Today I’ll teach you the main types of shanties. Just come on board, and you’ll soon walk the poop deck, or at least cover the waterfront, with confidence.
https://www.honest-broker.com/p/a-landlubbers-guide-to-sea-shanties

[🏨] Hotel Do Not Disturb Signs
https://www.flickr.com/photos/11068524@N04/

[🎃] In 2022, Sears, which filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy in 2018, was the top target by a wide margin. This year, that dubious distinction belonged to Bed Bath & Beyond, which filed for bankruptcy in April.
https://datascience.virginia.edu/news/thriving-department-store-spirit-halloween-data-science-project-examines-changing-economic

[🧠] “There’s a lot of anxiety about this and it’s considered a pretty big miss internally,” a person with knowledge of the matter told Power On.
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/newsletters/2023-10-22/what-is-apple-doing-in-ai-revamping-siri-search-apple-music-and-other-apps-lo1ffr7p

[🪸] The cold-water reefs are about a quarter of a mile beneath the sea surface, and the larger one is about a half-mile long.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/science/2023/10/28/pristine-deep-water-reefs-galapagos/

[🦅] Through rigorous attention to technical detail and thorough authenticity, this minor scene from an anime movie gave viewers the most accurate portrayal of modern aerial combat ever seen.
https://taskandpurpose.com/culture/realistic-aerial-combat-movie-patlabor-2/

I have been trying to remove my content on Twitter over the past year or so. I started with deleting just my basic tweets and then followed up with deleting all my replies. I found this service - TweetDelete.net, and they do a pretty good job with the first two tasks. I did pay for the service, and it seems that since the time that I paid for the service, they have changed pricing slightly, and the plan that I was on no longer supports my next task of removing myself from the Bluebird - which is to remove my favorited tweets of others.

This has been an undertaking that I don't know how far I have progressed. I have close to 7k favorites on Twitter since I joined the service in 2007. The TweetDelete.net service I mentioned above has favorite removal, except it limits the plan I am on to just 100 a month. I believe I have found out why that is such a low number, and I think it has to do with some killswitch for allowing unfavoriting on the Twitter side of things.

I found a few scripts and extensions that will go through and unfavorite tweets for you, and ( at least in the extension's case ) it looks like a human is unfavoriting them one by one; the problem lies within the fact that it seems that when you hit a certain threshold that twitter no longer shows you the "filled in heart" to allow you to unfavorite the ones on your "liked" profile list. I don't know if this is a byproduct of some techinical change or if it is something that was planned to not allow the data to be wiped. It is rather frustrating as I don't want to give up my Twitter account completely. I still tweet about live sporting events frequently and use Twitter in that manner because it is the king of that realm and probably will be for the foreseeable future.

I downloaded my archived information, so I am going to find the IDs of the favorites and see if there is some bulk option out there on the net somewhere with those Tweet IDs. Stay tuned.

Also, yes, I know it is called X now. I still call it Twitter.

[🇺🇸] “It’s kind of sad. However I’m mostly agreeable with it because I looked at rooms in West Yellowstone,” O’Connor said. “You’re looking at $190 to $290 in West Yellowstone, if you book in advance.” https://montanafreepress.org/2023/09/28/who-can-still-afford-a-yellowstone-road-trip/

[🦀] Spadaro has roughly a hundred crabs in the Florida Keys, and just shy of 200 at a new breeding facility in Sarasota. He’ll start dropping them into the ocean as soon as the end of the year or in early 2024, he said. https://www.vox.com/down-to-earth/2023/9/27/23883039/florida-coral-reef-caribbean-king-crabs-restoration

[🎥] Tokyo Story is laden with nonspeech; it punctuates the conversation of the grandparents, rendering their observations and questions melancholic, tentative. The grandfather in particular indulges in almost incessant hmms and sighs, each seeming to remark, worryingly, on the fragility and formality of the space in which parents and their adult children must meet. https://www.theparisreview.org/blog/2017/07/19/where-farts-come-in/

[✈️] They make more money from mileage programs than from flying planes—and it shows. https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2023/09/airlines-banks-mileage-programs/675374/

[🦤] You can’t reach an audience on X. You can’t organize on X. You can’t follow breaking news on X. The people who made Twitter fun have all given up. There’s nothing worth sticking around for anymore. https://davekarpf.substack.com/p/does-anyone-think-twitter-gets-better

[🏠] Originally bestowed by the Tsar to reward courtiers, this custom continued following the revolution, with Soviet cooperatives building dachas for their members https://www.theguardian.com/artanddesign/gallery/2023/sep/13/a-fairytale-wooden-world-soviet-country-cottages-in-pictures

[🏎️] Students from ETH Zurich and Lucerne University of Applied Sciences and Arts have broken the previous world record for acceleration with their hand-?built electric racing car, mythen. The vehicle accelerated from zero to 100 km/h in 0.956 seconds over a distance of 12.3 metres. https://ethz.ch/en/news-and-events/eth-news/news/2023/09/from-zero-to-one-hundred-in-0-956-seconds.html

[🎓] Last year’s freshman class at Tulane was nearly two-thirds female. https://www.nytimes.com/2023/09/08/magazine/men-college-enrollment.html

[🎹] Press any of the keys on your keyboard, in slow rhythm http://touchpianist.com/

[🎼] The thing about writing songs for me — I’ve never felt I was very good about writing anything that dealt with happiness because I don’t think happiness is very interesting. https://www.vulture.com/article/bernie-taupin-in-conversation.html

[🤖] As customers ask whether they can use Microsoft’s Copilot services and the output they generate without worrying about copyright claims, we are providing a straightforward answer: yes, you can, and if you are challenged on copyright grounds, we will assume responsibility for the potential legal risks involved. https://blogs.microsoft.com/on-the-issues/2023/09/07/copilot-copyright-commitment-ai-legal-concerns/

[🚂] However, if you are using brute force, you will be able to put 13 curved rails in a circle, but that way the track is too much under tension, and it's probably not good for the duplo pieces. https://puzzling.stackexchange.com/questions/122232/is-this-duplo-train-track-under-too-much-tension

[🪸] The first of two railcars bound for the Reef Project is scheduled to depart Thursday morning for the Georgia coast from MARTA’s South Yard in College Park. https://atlanta.urbanize.city/post/marta-reefs-railcars-bound-bottom-atlantic-ocean

[🍅] The writer of a negative review says that Bunker 15 lobbied them to change it; if the critic wanted to “give it a (barely) overall positive then I do know the editors at Rotten Tomatoes and can get it switched,” a Bunker 15 employee wrote. https://www.vulture.com/article/rotten-tomatoes-movie-rating.html

[☄️] Comet Nishimura was discovered only in August but will be closest to Earth in a week’s time – just before dawn on Tuesday 12 September. https://www.independent.co.uk/space/comet-nishimura-space-astronomy-b2404980.html

[📊] It turns out that the fastest a human being has ever traveled was 39,897 kilometers per hour. That was the crew of the Apollo 10 mission returning to earth. That happened on 26 May, 1969. https://kolektiva.social/@HeavenlyPossum/110989789650647995

[📺] In May, Disney+ announced a content removal plan designed to cut US$1.5bn worth of content, meaning it substantially reduces the company’s value, giving it a lot less tax to pay. https://www.theguardian.com/tv-and-radio/2023/aug/29/the-great-cancellation-why-megabucks-tv-shows-are-vanishing-without-a-trace

[🤖] What will happen to AI is boring old capitalism. Its staying power will come in the form of replacing competent, expensive humans with crappy, cheap robots. https://drewdevault.com/2023/08/29/2023-08-29-AI-crap.html

[🗺️] The company owns not only many of the world’s most popular fonts but also exchanges like MyFonts where font designers bring their work to market.
https://www.oneearth.org/bioregions-2023/

[🖋️] The company owns not only many of the world’s most popular fonts but also exchanges like MyFonts where font designers bring their work to market.
https://thehustle.co/where-do-fonts-come-from/

[🤖] What will happen to AI is boring old capitalism. Its staying power will come in the form of replacing competent, expensive humans with crappy, cheap robots.
https://drewdevault.com/2023/08/29/2023-08-29-AI-crap.html

[🌱] "I made a 800 square feet garden in San Francisco's Mission District. Planning started in 2015 and we finally planted in January 2017. The process involved tearing up concrete, pouring a new sidewalk, hauling in clean soil, and patiently waiting for the wet season to plant."
https://zachklein.com/Sidewalk+Garden

[🌐] "There are few, if any, legal domains where hypocrisy is as baked into the ecosystem as it is with web scraping."
https://blog.ericgoldman.org/archives/2023/08/web-scraping-for-me-but-not-for-thee-guest-blog-post.htm

[🌲] Tiny forests have been planted across Europe, in Africa, throughout Asia and in South America, Russia and the Middle East. India has hundreds, and Japan, where it all began, has thousands.
https://www.nytimes.com/2023/08/24/climate/tiny-forests-climate-miyawaki.html

[💀] “Her mother’s grave: the setting seems an unusually grim, even ghoulish locale for reading, writing, or love-making,” Gilbert notes
https://bigthink.com/high-culture/mary-shelley-cemetery/

[👻] "Hunting down the mysterious musician that lent a wonderfully strange piece to one of the biggest films of all time"
https://medium.com/cuepoint/how-mick-smiley-made-the-best-ghostbusters-song-then-disappeared-efccd93cce8d

[🐟] "Like their relatives, the onesided livebearers, four-eyed fishes mate only on one side, right-"handed" males with left-"handed" females and vice versa."
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Four-eyed_fish

[🐄🔔] "Ferrell still has uncles and cousins who live here. He can rattle off the names of towns in northeast North Carolina with ease."
https://open.substack.com/pub/jeremymarkovich/p/will-ferrell-snl-more-cowbell-roanoke-rapids-nc

[🛰️] "Yet the observations are also perplexing because few astronomers expected JWST to find so many young, hungry black holes — and surveys are turning them up by the dozen."
https://www.quantamagazine.org/jwst-spots-giant-black-holes-all-over-the-early-universe-20230814/

[🐜] "The aesthetics of the video were determined by the ants' choice."
https://vimeo.com/25976354

[🏰] Disney is, from this point forward, not much different than Taylor Swift: sure, there is money to be made (hopefully) in areas like streaming, but the real durable value and outsized profits will come from real life experiences.
https://stratechery.com/2023/disneys-taylor-swift-era/

[🌺] Rumours have spread of estate agents approaching Hawaiian property owners in Lahaina, asking about possible deals.
https://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-66507019

[🐖] His Preface, “The Freedom of the Press,” was omitted from the first edition of the book, then disappeared, and was not rediscovered until 1971.
https://mindmatters.ai/2023/08/a-warning-from-the-unpublished-preface-to-orwells-animal-farm/

[🌵] The wells didn’t just provide water for the donkeys and horses, but were also used by more than 57 other species, including numerous birds, other herbivores such as mule deer, and even mountain lions.
https://theconversation.com/feral-desert-donkeys-are-digging-wells-giving-water-to-parched-wildlife-159909

[🍗] “You know, that company is just too big to control now,” he said, “I'm sorry I sold it back in 1964. It would have been smaller now, but a lot better. People see me up there doing those commercials and they wonder how I could ever let such products bear my name. It's downright .embarrassing.”
https://www.nytimes.com/1976/09/09/archives/for-the-colonel-it-was-fingerlickin-bad.html

[🚢] Last week canal administrator Ricaurte Vásquez called the situation “unusually severe” and warned that “significant restrictions” would remain in place until September next year.
https://gcaptain.com/panama-canal-draught-restrictions-spark-liner-surcharges/

[🐈] “Recent data indicate a significant overlap in the appearance of house mice (Mus musculus) and cats in Late Neolithic Eastern Europe, and suggest that the house mouse was an important factor for the dispersal of cats within Europe.”
https://bigthink.com/strange-maps/cat-migration-europe/

[🕸️] There are still relatively few Thread devices available to buy, and some platforms only halfheartedly support the protocol (most notably Amazon), making buying and setting up Thread-powered gadgets confusing and complicated.
https://www.theverge.com/23820078/matters-biggest-problem-apple-google-thread-border-router-interoperability

[💀] Some cappers threw rocks when tourists approached a rival caver, or they masqueraded as fellow tourists who had just learned that Mammoth Cave was too filled with kerosene smoke to enjoy.
https://www.smithsonianmag.com/history/how-the-kentucky-cave-wars-reshaped-the-states-tourism-industry-180982585/

[📷] Svarbova often captures a mood of detachment through the expressionless faces of her subjects and an aqueous color palette, blurring the distinction between the past, present, and future.
https://www.thisiscolossal.com/2023/08/maria-svarbova-pools/

[🍅] The brand’s marinara sauce is beloved by many chefs and home cooks who typically wouldn’t opt for a jarred sauce, and it was the top finisher in two Washington Post taste tests of jarred marinara sauces.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/food/2023/08/07/campbells-buys-raos-sovos-brands/

[🥩] We know this because osmosis and the diffusion of salt in proteins is a proven process. Heck, we have entire guides dedicated to brining and dry brining; brining, after all, is exactly what salt in a marinade is doing. I’d even go so far as to say that the most important ingredient in any marinade is salt, period.
https://www.seriouseats.com/should-you-marinate-meat-7565205

We live just outside Atlanta, Georgia, but spend about a month or so each year in Florida. One of my favorite stores down there is Wawa. I am trying to understand how we don't have them all over Atlanta. If you have never been in one, I don't know how to describe other than take the service level of a Chick-Fil-A and put it into a gas station/convenience store setup. They are clean, the staff is friendly, and they have certain things that make you know it's a Wawa. I always like the security person who is usually always on staff; there is generally at least two registers open, and, to a geek like me leagues above other convenience stores in the ordering and payment tech.

Having lived in Atlanta my whole life, gas stations are just stopping points during the day to refill on gas. Usually, it is paid for at the pump, and you go about your day, but my opinion on them changed when we went to Reykjavik last year. We usually ate dinner at a restaurant at night, but before that, we would hit a convenience store during the day. Most of them were 10/11 stores, but I began to see ( as someone who never lived downtown ) how integral to a community something like a Bodega can be for walkable communities. Having never really lived in one, I never understood the need for quick access to food, sometimes daily.

Last night while browsing my YT subs, I saw that Company Man ( an excellent channel ) did a video yesterday on Wawa. Great watch:

[🍺] "When this is done we see that consumption of pure alcohol was at least 2-4 times higher in the past."
https://www.lefineder.com/p/when-did-people-stop-being-drunk

[🍽️] "About an hour and a half separates the earliest eating state from the latest."
https://flowingdata.com/2023/07/25/when-is-dinner-by-state/

[🕹️] "Released in 1983, it was felt that Discs of Tron could stand as its own game, and is the rarer of the two. The game was released as what’s known as an ‘environmental’ cabinet, designed to immerse the player literally ‘inside’ the action."
https://arcadeblogger.com/2023/07/22/environmental-discs-of-tron-roadside-pickup/

[🏌️] "Golfers are playing more golf on weekdays, for example 143% more on Wednesday in 2022 vs 2019"
https://nbloom.people.stanford.edu/sites/g/files/sbiybj24291/files/media/file/golfingfromhome.pdf?mod=ANLink

[🏭] "The Process of Mass-producing Rubber Bands. A Rubber Band Manufacturing Factory in Japan"
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VXMgeW7SzA0

[🚗] "The car manufacturers got so desperate for chips that they started buying up washing machines for the microchips in them, extracting the chips and discarding the washing machines like some absurdo-dystopian cyberpunk walnut-shelling machine"
https://pluralistic.net/2023/07/24/rent-to-pwn/#kitt-is-a-demon

So be sure to catch up on these blogs, which are pretty much daily reads for me.

TAGN - Welcome to Blaugust 23
Chasing Dings - OMG it's that time again already!
Nomadic Gamers - Blaugust – Day 1
Scopique - And They’re Off! Blaugust 2023 Begins
Shadowz - Welcome to Blaugust
Syp - Biobreak
Inventory Full - And So It Begins
Belghast - Blaugust is Thriving

Many more people are participating; those are just the ones I have been reading for the past few years ( hooray for RSS ). I can't wait to see what everyone discusses this time around the sun.

About two weeks ago, I came across this random game on Steam called Dave The Diver. I had never heard of it, but it piqued my interest because of the diving aspect of it, and I freely admit I sometimes enjoy a simple game of Cooking Mama. I watched the trailer and thought it had some, frankly, weird aspects to the game:

Then I saw a buddy of mine paying on Discord one day and asked him how he liked it, and he was beaming about it, which was a good thing because he usually likes those non-shooters that I dig to destress ( Stardew, etc.). So I decided to snag it.

The game is astonishing because it has an enormous main storyline that paces well.

The whole lost civilization thing fits in well with the overall RPG story. The most exciting thing about the game is how well the mini-games fit into the game so well that you don't believe you are just playing this wide variety of core games, but you are playing mini-games that mean something in the sense of the story. It is really well put together and cohesive.

If I get into it anymore, it will ruin the story; try it. It's only $20, and MintRocket did a hell of a job for only charging that much.

I posted this on Discord to some friends about 2-3 weeks ago, and it keeps getting more accurate by the day.

Social Media has collapsed for me; it's a good thing. However, I still have small niches that I like to visit based on the subject matter. Until a few weeks ago, I had always felt like Twitter was the end all be all of Live sports. I can't count the number of football, auto races, and soccer games I have sat on the couch and watched the opinions of people I follow on Twitter go by as I watch the game or race. Then I found the MLB+ feed on BlueSky. I watched the All-Star game last week, and I have to admit it was pretty fun. The people on there all seemed reasonable, and I wasn't skipping every 3rd message because it was either an official ad or someone trying to sell something using popular hashtags on their own, as is common on Twitter. It felt like I was at a bar watching the game. A large bar, but a bar all the same once people started interacting with each other. Also, I have become addicted to the Moss and Gardening feeds on BlueSky, which are pretty cool. With BlueSky, you really have to find your niche.

Mastodon still feels very, very geeky, and I love it for that. I like that there is a hurdle to get into and set up on the site. That is a slight ( ever so subtle ) test to ensure you understand what you are doing as a gateway. This could also be advantageous for keeping out the bots ( better than $5/month ) and make Mastodon my favorite new social network in the long run. ( Are we calling this social 3.0 yet? Did that already get taken by blockchain peeps? 4.0? ). One of the things about Mastodon is that you rarely hear inside its ecosystem if someone you know has popped up. I posted about Larry 'Major Nelson' Hyrb leaving Microsoft this morning, and I went to see if he might have a Masto handle, and sure enough, he does, and also a BlueSky. I wish I had known that earlier, but most people advertise via Twitter, which I am trying not to log on to for any reason these days.

I hate Facebook Proper, and I only have an account with them because I needed one to get going on Oculus. I do have an Instagram ( it is weird that people don't say 'account' after Instagram. It is it's own thing - almost Kleenex-ian ), but I rarely post or read on it, and it is usually to keep up with my kids on the app. Threads is right out, and if and when they join with ActivityPub, I will immediately block it on the Mastodon server I run.

Then there is the elephant in the room ( at least for me ), Discord. It isn't threaded ( per se ), it isn't public, there are mods, it is the old-school IRC experience updated, but with one caveat… they are, in fact, keeping up with every conversation you have, and don't think those bots you invited also are not keeping up with everything too. I feel like Discord is in a weird place right now. While I love and cherish the service it provides, I am always hesitant because I know at the flip of a switch, someone could buy them and then use all those records for whatever they want in a Bluebird-like future.

The end game should be getting back to this form of writing ( blogs ) and RSS and coming up with good ways to securely thread and have invited group conversations that the host needs no record of the conversation's contents. It could be an excellent idea to toy around with. This is quite funny, considering the last tech wave was people that wanted to record EVERYTHING on a blockchain, and now the pendulum flies to the other side of the clock.

If all four of us are around for dinner ( and not at some sports practice ), we usually try to play a quick card game when we eat dinner at night. Here to Slay ( Unstable Games ) has been a hit at our impromptu game nights here during dinner for the last few months; that has been Unstable Unicorns with a few of the expansion packs.

For my birthday, I got a copy, and it is a little more in-depth than Unicorns, but once your playgroup has played a few rounds, it gets entertaining and becomes a quickplay; here is why:

Easy to learn: It is a relatively simple game ( although it can take some time to understand the strategy - which I consider the layer underneath just learning how to play ). It has straightforward rules that can be understood quickly ( and a little card to let you review them whenever you want ), so players can jump right in and start having fun.

Engaging gameplay: The gameplay is engaging and strategic over the course of the whole game by requiring players to make decisions and think critically about their moves. The game combines elements of luck and skill, making each unique and exciting.

Art/Graphics: The game's artwork is beautiful and hilarious, featuring a colorful cast of characters that players can't help but love. We all get a kick when someone lays down certain hero cards. The artwork adds to the game's fun and whimsical nature, making it a blast to see the artwork on the card you just drew.

Quick: ( caveat: once you play a few games ), It's nice because each game lasts only around 30 minutes. This makes it an ideal choice for game nights or casual gatherings ( or playing at dinner as we do ), as we can easily fit multiple games into a single session or try to play one game over dinner.

I can't recommend the game enough just don't go try to find the OG Kickstarter ver$$ion 👀 ) and make sure you snag the two expansion packs which add Necromancers/Berserkers and Druids/Fighters.

Also, I was in a rush and probably should have drained the sun-dried tomatoes a bit before putting them in. Although they gave the dish an oily look, they were damn delicious. I think I will add some bacon to this next time.

Great and super simple recipe.

Marry Me Chicken ( https://littlesunnykitchen.com/marry-me-chicken/#wprm-recipe-container-23226 )

On Saturday Night, I knew we would be watching football all day ( Go Dawgs! ), and the TV in our Den is easily watchable from most sport in the kichen so I didn't mind a good 2 hr-ish recipe. I have wanted to try this one for a while, so I decided to dive in:

Beef Short Rib Bourguignon With Garlicky Panko Gremolata ( https://food52.com/recipes/83128-beef-short-rib-bourguignon-recipe )

I was worried we would not be able to find short ribs on such short notice ( we went shopping that morning ), and I was surprised to see two packs which totaled around 2.5 lbs. Braising them was easy; overall, the recipe was pretty easy and time-consuming. Lindsey got me some new cookware for Christmas ( I will write up about it sometime, it's magical ), so it was nice getting to try it out along with the La Cruset that I don't get to use much.

Process:

Result:

New Year's Day was our usual fare. We do the patented Southern NYD formula that includes Black Eyed Peas, Collard Greens, Cornbread, and Pork Chops and tossed an extra Pineapple we had on there also. Pretty solid meal.

Mine:

Finally, on the 2nd, I decided I wanted to try this recipe:

Chicken Vesuvio ( https://damndelicious.net/2022/12/26/chicken-vesuvio/ )

I have never made a Vesuvio before, and this looked like an excellent time to try. I am a big fan of Chungah's blog, and this recipe has been waiting for a while. I needed a night when I wasn't working and had time to try it. I did not cook the potatoes with the meal ( did them separate in the oven), and they came out fine, although I wish I had started them a little later in the recipe. They were not dry, per se, but I should have incorporated them into the meal or started them later in the process so they didn't sit out as much. There was also a bit of the leftover white wine drank during the cooking, which could have easily played a part.

Mine:

All in all, it was a good weekend for cooking.

HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT > MIME > Database > Content Type > image/jpeg > Extension, then right-click on Modify and change the string value to .jpg or .jpeg, whichever you prefer.

So just a reminder (and also so I don't google it again because I always forget it is under 'designers'), when you get this error:

Saving changes is not permitted. The changes that you have made require the following tables to be dropped and re-created.

Just go to Tools -> Options -> Click 'Designers' (should put you into Table and Database Designers Sub Menu)

And uncheck: Prevent Saving changes that require table re-creation.

Love those hidden toggles.

Software-based streaming works, but you need a workhorse of a machine that can handle the streaming along with whatever game you are playing. The Xbox S doesn't have this capability at 1080 60 fps, so I picked up a MyPin 4k streaming Capture "Card" that connects to the 3rd party using USB 3.0. The device seems to work pretty well at 1080@60, although it has taken a few nights to get everything set up correctly.

At first, I started using XSplit as the streaming software, but I have since switched over to Open Broadcaster (OBS). The old setup had me with a set of headphones attached to the controller (game audio), and I used a Turtle Beach external Mic. There was a little bit of lag in the mic audio hitting the stream, so I went looking for a better configuration.

What I ended up with last night is pretty much using OBS as a software-based mixer. The only problem was that I could see the Game Audio coming across the mixer, but I couldn't hear it with the headphone/mic combo I use on the PC, and I could not figure out how to hear it. Finally, I figured it out:

So in the Mixer panel of OBS, you will see all your channels; hopefully, you will see the mic channel working as it should (whichever mic you have hooked up) and you should see game audio also coming through:

1.) Go up to File -> Settings and select "Audio" from the left-hand panel:

2.) Switch it to your headphones (or whatever out you prefer), then drop back to your Mixer window and click on the gear/settings icon on the right for the Audio Input Capture (MyPin card) and select 'Advanced Audio Properties'. This will bring up the following dialog

3.) Switch the channels you want to hear to 'Monitor and Output' just like you on a hardware mixer, and you should be good to go.

There may be a slight echo on your side if you switch the mic to this, but it doesn't get out to the stream. From there you should be good to go.