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I often use the YouTube app on my Amazon Fire TV device. Most of the time, I will simply press the “Skip Ad” button, but I started a video as I walked to the refrigerator. To my surprise, the ad was about 44-minutes long, it was the premiere episode of NBC’s new show, Zoey’s Extraordinary Playlist. I had no idea YouTube ads were so long or were complete episodes of a show on network television.

A win for capitalism – Iranian factory makes U.S. and Israeli flags to burn

KHOMEIN, Iran (Reuters) – Business is booming at Iran’s largest flag factory which makes U.S., British and Israeli flags for Iranian protesters to burn.

At the factory in the town of Khomein, southwest of the capital Tehran, young men and women print the flags by hand then hang them up to dry. The factory produces about 2,000 U.S. and Israeli flags a month in its busiest periods, and more than 1.5 million square feet of flags a year.

GMC is going to bring back the HUMMER but it’s going to be electric and have some intriguing specs according to a press release. It will have 1,000 horsepower, 11,500 lb-ft of torque and will be able to do zero to 60 mph in three seconds. GM has created a website for it but it’s all teaser stuff for a Super Bowl commercial with the reveal coming on May 20, 2020.

Watch the first episode of Picard for free on YouTube – The pilot episode of the new series from CBS All Access is available without a subscription for a limited time

Most Texans think the country is headed in the wrong direction, new poll shows

The Texas Lyceum poll found that 59% of Texans surveyed say the U.S. is headed in the wrong direction, with 41% saying the country is on the right track.

In addition, 11% of Texans say health care is the most important issue facing the country, followed by 10% who say immigration and 9% who say President Donald Trump is.

Meanwhile, a plurality of respondents, 19%, say immigration is the most important issue facing Texas today.

When it comes to President Trump, 36% of those polled say he is doing a “very poor job.”

I see the prettiest girl … pic.twitter.com/CkbEZn4YeQ

— B@$$ (@24onlinee) January 30, 2020

I saw the Geico lumberyard commercial for the first time yesterday and I bellied laughed even though it’s not that funny. It looks like it’s been out for over a month but it’s new to me.

While I like magic tricks I’ve never been much for card tricks. I have such a short attention span that I can’t focus and lose my mind trying to remember what rank and suit of each card.

John Bolton Likes Tweet Saying Trump Should ‘Fire the Moron Who Hired John Bolton’

Female Firefighter Fired Over Instagram Posts

Many of the firefighters at Kalispell, Montana’s Evergreen Fire Rescue have personal Instagram accounts where they share photos related to their work. The men are sometimes shirtless, posing proudly in their turndowns (the heavy gear traditionally associated with firefighting) and in front of firetrucks, trumpeting their pride at their profession in between posts relating to their hobbies, friends, and families. Presley Pritchard, a 27-year-old firefighter paramedic, was no different, including photos of herself in uniform mixed in among posts about fitness and workouts she created as a personal trainer.

Pritchard’s content was (and is), for the most part, the straightforward stuff fitness influencer accounts are made of, with a gentle Great Plains twist. Her personal posts were mixed in with published sponsored posts in partnership with wellness brands, but the latter never overlapped with her work as a firefighter. In most of the photos and videos she shares with her 87,000 followers (as of January 2020), she wears tank tops, sports bras, and leggings, usually while at the gym, and a pair of wireless, rose gold Beats headphones. In a few posts, she totes a gun or poses in snowboarding gear. In her captions, she espouses perseverance, positivity, and the power of Jesus.

Scientists tried to recreate a mummy’s voice with an electronic larynx

Robots learn to sweat to stop overheating

Hollow, pressurized reservoirs inside the fingers are filled with water and connected to the surface via ducts made of heat-reactive plastic. When the plastic hits a certain temperature, the pores open and water is pushed to the surface. There, it evaporates with a cooling effect more than twice as effective as those of the sweatiest beasts in the animal kingdom.

But why sweat? Aren’t there easier ways to cool robots? Well, that depends.

Most robots are made from metal, which is an excellent conductor and therefore good at dispersing heat by itself. But soft robots, which are designed for delicate tasks like medical procedures and packing fruit, are made from rubber, a good insulator. If and when soft robots become commonplace, they’ll need their own ways to stay cool.

There are other advantages to sweating, too. By building sweat glands into a machine, you can cool it below the temperature of its surroundings, something you can’t achieve with environmental cooling like fans.

Belk, one of the anchor stores at the Dallas Galleria mall will be closing, but the mall is about to get a major makeover. I think in the next ten years there will basically only be two Dallas malls, the Galleria and Northpark. Of course, some of the burbs will still exist, I can’t picture Stonebriar in Frisco closing any time soon. But good gracious, please put Music City Mall (formally Vista Ridge) out of its misery.

News Corp Unveils Its News Aggregator Knewz, And Oh Man Is It Ugly

Knewz is a website of aggregated news with no verticals, no images, no editorializing, no filtering — in other words, no governing principles of organization or curation. It is, if nothing else, a very confusing visual experience.

Tennessee Rep. Van Huss files bill to recognize CNN, Washington Post as ‘fake news’

“The older I get, the better I used to be.” – Lee Trevino

DaughterGeeding decided to start a newspaper for her classroom. The first edition has articles about current school events, the former headmaster visiting the campus, and comics. She had WifeGeeding print enough copies for everyone in her class.

I miss Andy Rooney complaining about random things.

I bought these at the grocery store yesterday and now I’m diabetic. I didn’t even take a bite, it happened by osmosis.

I have Kobe fatigue and his and his daughter’s funeral haven’t been planned yet.

West Virginia governor urges unhappy Virginia counties to secede and join his state

West Virginia Gov. Jim Justice (R) encouraged Virginia counties unhappy with the Democratic-controlled government in Richmond to secede from the state and join his.

“If you’re not happy where you’re at, come on down,” Justice said reportedly said at a Tuesday press conference with Liberty University President Jerry Falwell Jr. “If you’re not truly happy where you are, we stand with open arms to take you from Virginia or anywhere you may be. We stand strongly behind the Second Amendment, and we stand strongly for the unborn.”

I had no idea BYU has its own creamery or that it was famous.

Romney busted for bringing ‘contraband’ BYU chocolate milk bottle to impeachment trial

(KUTV) — There are two beverages senators are allowed to bring onto the Senate floor — water and milk.

Utah Sen. Mitt Romney was busted by a colleague for bringing his own bottle of chocolate milk. Bottles are not allowed.

That chocolate milk comes from Brigham Young University’s Creamery, which is famous for its ice cream and milk products. BYU is Romney’s alma mater.

Romney left to the Republican cloakroom and returned with the chocolate milk in a glass, the Wall Street Journal reported.

She says, we’ve got to hold on to what we’ve got
It doesn’t make a difference if we make it or not
We’ve got each other and that’s a lot for love
We’ll give it a shot

DOJ Assistant AG Apologizes to Judge After Illegally Practicing Law for a Couple of Months

Assistant Attorney General Jeffrey B. Clark stopped paying his dues to remain in good standing with the federal bar in October of last year—an oversight he discovered on December 9, 2019, according to a two-page letter submitted with the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia.

US colleges are trying to install location tracking apps on students’ phones – Supposedly an easier way to track attendance

Barely over a year ago, we pointed out how dystopian it seemed when Chinese schools added “smart uniforms” to track their students’ attendance. But US colleges are already testing out a similar tactic with a location tracking app, which students are now apparently expected to install on their phones.

I say “apparently” because there’s some confusion over whether the schools are actually forcing this on their students. The Kansas City Star reported that at the University of Missouri, new students “won’t be given a choice” of whether to install the SpotterEDU app, which uses Apple’s iBeacons to broadcast a Bluetooth signal that can help the phone figure out whether a student is actually in a room.

I think Tim Tebow would make a good coach on The Biggest Loser.

I regret to inform you that Mike Bloomberg attempted to shake a dog’s mouth. pic.twitter.com/hKsagJ4xAf

— Christopher J. Hale (@chrisjollyhale) January 28, 2020

We Owe Food Regulation to a 19th-Century Chemist Who Poisoned His Colleagues –
The Poison Squad, as they became known, was a group of men who willingly consumed dangerous substances to force the government into consumer protections

Impeachment came up frequently when talking to Texas voters. Most were fatigued by it all, but those paying close attention defied party stereotypes. For our Three Meals series, Major Garrett traveled across the Lone Star state to speak with voters about the president and the 2020 election.

There’s going to be a generation of folks who will grow up thinking the ABC News show 20/20 has something to do with this calendar year.

I’ve seen a lot of folks on social media mention the coronavirus is nothing to worry about and the coverage is overblown. But the one thing which makes me think it must be a big deal is that China is so concerned about it that they decided to build a 1,000-bed hospital in a mere 10 days. Ten days! Popular Mechanics states they are doing it in just six days.

If you’re wondering just how this is possible, Chinese officials have taken on such projects before, like when they built a similar temporary facility in Beijing during the 2003 SARS outbreak. Officials completed that hospital, which also held 1,000 beds, in just a week, by a workforce of over 7,000. Over the course of two months, the hospital staff treated nearly 15 percent of SARS patients there, according to the Post.

Not that I’m complaining, but I’m really surprised that Sarah Palin isn’t working for the Trump administration in some capacity. The same goes for Michele Bachmann and to a lesser extent, Rick Santorum. If Palin were president, I think she’d be more incompetent than the current president but in much less legal trouble.

Frank Sinatra’s Italian marble and gold-seated Las Vegas toilets are up for auction. Rumor has it the golden toilet seats were made out of Sammy Davis Jr.’s jewelry he lost in a bet to the Chairman of the Board. Yes, I totally fabricated that story.

This Russian missile looks like something straight out of an action flick. – YouTube

She’s 75, And a Step Ahead of Her Competition – A Texas stair climber trains with a high school track team to prep for a race up the Eiffel Tower

An Irish Castle in Texas Full of Llamas

The castle, appropriately dubbed ShangriLlama, is a replica of Waterford Castle, situated near the south coast of Ireland.

The ShangriLlama replica is located about 40 minutes outside Dallas and is an ideal interactive experience for anyone who likes the South American animals or Irish castles.

• Last I checked, the Abilene area wasn’t considered North Texas.
• A hundred-and-fifty pounds didn’t sound like much to me, but actually seeing a picture of it frightens me.

Mountain lion weighing in at 150 pounds shot in North Texas

Oscar Mayer Wienermobile pulled over in Waukesha County

The Waukesha County Sheriff’s Department pulled over the Wienermobile for not following the Move Over Law. The driver of the Weinermobile was given a verbal warning.

Snake bath