Bag of Randomness
Monday, August 24, 2026

I’m really enjoying HBO’s Lanterns. And as much as I’m enjoying all the Tom Osborne references over the past two weeks, I highly doubt the majority of their viewers understand them. But I do question some of their casting decisions, especially the sheriff.

Republicans have controlled Congress and the White House for a while. I’m still waiting for their healthcare fix.

I watched Ryan Gosling’s Drive for the first time over the weekend. As I usually do, I read the IMDB trivia and Wikipedia pages after a film. Apparently, Hugh Jackman was originally going to star. As good as Gosling was, Jackman would have been a much better choice for a gritty and seasoned stoic stunt car driver.

The soundtrack was surprisingly good.

Sorority rush videos are trending a lot. It’s no surprise that so many brands try to align themselves with the yearly ritual. It’s so pitifully sad seeing so many young women reek of low self-esteem and acceptance.

While researching how much the early U.S. government borrowed from France and how quickly it repaid it, I discovered several interesting things.

  • Our government has an Office of the Historian.

    The Office of the Historian is staffed by professional historians who are experts in the history of U.S. foreign policy and the institutional history of the Department of State. Our historians possess unparalleled research experience in State Department and other government records. The Office is directed by The Historian of the U.S. Department of State.

    • The current Historian of the U.S. Department of State is John Powers, though I can’t find much information about him from a quick Google search. However, here’s his LinkedIn profile. I was a little surprised that he doesn’t have a doctorate, but he does have a master’s from William and Mary and has held his current role for a little over two years. It seems like he’s only held government jobs, starting as an archivist at the National Archives and working his way up to the National Security Council.
  • I also found the Grateful American Foundation, a cool nonpartisan organization founded on Presidents’ Day 2014, that aims to restore enthusiasm for American history among kids and adults.

As to answer my initial inquiry, the early American government borrowed over $2 million from France during the Revolutionary War, starting in 1775. The debt was cleared by 1795 using domestic funds, new loans, and a private buyout by an American banker, taking roughly 17 to 18 years to repay in full from the start of the primary loans.

The private buyout by an American banker was new to me, but it did sound like a very American capitalist thing to do, lol. The banker was James Swan. Though successful in his business activities related to the millions of dollars owed by the United States to France, he actually died in poverty. On principles of loyalty, he spent 22 years—more than a quarter of his life—in the Paris Sainte-Pélagie Prison.

A lot of folks are rooting for this undrafted Cowboys rookie, the first Navajo to sign a contract to play in the NFL. Some folks were wondering about Jim Thorpe, but he was part of the Sac and Fox Nation.

Surely, Jim Thorpe has to be the greatest athlete in Oklahoma history. Briefly:

  • Won gold in the 1912 Olympics in both the pentathlon and decathlon. For the latter, someone stole his shoes just before he was due to compete; he found a mismatched pair of replacements, including one from a trash can, and won the gold medal wearing them. Actually, he set a world record of 8,412 points in the decathlon that stood for 36 years.
  • He played 12 seasons in professional football and was part of the Pro Football Hall of Fame’s inaugural class. As you walk into the entrance, you are greeted by his statue. He also served as the first president of the American Professional Football Association, which soon became the National Football League (NFL). And was the first president of the NFL.
  • Played six seasons of Major League Baseball for teams like the New York Giants and Cincinnati Reds.
  • He played professional basketball.
  • For a brief time in 1913, he was considering going into professional hockey for the Tecumseh Hockey Club in Toronto, Ontario, Canada. The prior year, he was the Inter-Collegiate Ballroom Dancing Champion.

For anyone who’s a fan of the Traces of Texas X (Twitter) account, here’s a recent announcement.

An East Texas (Winnsboro ISD) school board president will keep his leadership position after fellow trustees declined to reorganize the board fewer than two weeks after he was arrested for allegedly failing to report the sexual abuse of a student.

LinkedIn says its “Seems like AI slop” feedback option has been used more than 1 million times since it launched on July 30.

 

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