Your Bag of Nothing for Tuesday, January 28, 2025

  • Surprisingly, the dealership is still working on my Chevy Bolt, and I’m still driving that excellent Alpha Romero sports cart they loaned me. I’m getting attached to it, which scares me, but I certainly don’t like paying for premium gas.
  • I’m really into AI, so news that the Chinese created a version called Deepseek for cheaper and was the number one downloaded app interested me. I’m surprised so many Americans are willing to download it and enter their private information in it. Granted, I’m not thrilled knowing OpenAI has a record of everything I’ve used it for, but I’d rather they have my data than a communist country.
  • I think Philly’s strategy against Kansas City is to keep their offense off the field as much as possible. That means establishing a strong run game, and they have the running back to do it.
  • I was surprised to learn that not only is Henry Kissinger buried at Arlington National Cemetary, but he requested a “monument” in his memory be erected to mark the site where he is buried. Geeze, talk about audacious. His will directed his executors to “pay all amounts necessary” to erect the tribute per “then-applicable regulations.” His estate was worth over $80 million at the time of his death.
  • Amanda Knox liked one of my comments on Bluesky yesterday.
  • Big thumbs up for the updated CBS Evening News. It’s not as scripted as a traditional broadcast and emphasizes the anchors engaging with the reporters.
  • Here are a few more interesting tidbits about Japan’s formal surrender on the deck of the USS Missouri:
    • See that flag hanging on the left? It has 31 stars. Why was it there? It flew over Commodore Perry’s ship in that exact location in 1853–54 when he led the U.S. Navy’s Far East Squadron into Tokyo Bay to force the opening of Japan’s ports to foreign trade. He was also a distant MacArthur relative, which was why MacArthur requested it to be there. A replica of this historic flag can be seen today on the Surrender Deck of the Battleship Missouri Memorial in Pearl Harbor.
    • The U.S. flag flown was just a regular flag, nothing special about it, though there are rumors it was the same flag that flew over the White  House the day Japan bombed Pearl Harbor. However, MacArthur took it to Tokyo and flew it over his headquarters there.
    • Since Five-Star Admiral Chester W. Nimitz was on the ship, a blue flag with five white-pointed stars in a circle flew. Five Star General MacArthur also wanted his flag flown, basically the same, but red, also flying but demanded it be flown at the same height, not below. Sailors had to weld an additional flagpole to make this happen.
    • Japan’s foreign minister, the guy in front with the top hat, had a wooden leg. When sailors had a rehearsal the day before, the stand-in for him used a wooden mop handle.
    • The British sent a table for the signing, but the Americans didn’t want to use it, and it wasn’t big enough anyway. So they got a table from the officers’ mess and overlaid it with a green felt cloth the ship’s officers used for playing cards.
  • I had no idea they looked like this underwater with their body in a vertical position.

    So this is what they look underwater…

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    — Nature’s masterpiece (@nature-view.bsky.social) January 24, 2025 at 11:07 PM

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Your Bag of Nothing for Monday, January 27, 2025

  • I’ve seen this photo a thousand times but learned something new about it over the weekend as I went down another WWII rabbit hole. Standing directly behind General MacArthur (sitting) is U.S. Army General Jonathan Wainwright IV. The photo was taken September 2, 1945. Three weeks prior, he had been in a Japanese POW camp for three years. MacArthur signed his name with several pens. He immediately gave one to Wainwright, saving one for West Point and the other for Annapolis. I always thought that was some cool forethought. Here’s a description of what happened the moment he was rescued:

    The emaciated American hero stood silently in tattered clothing. The OSS men stared at each other with stunned disbelief.

    Wainwright broke the silence. “Are you really an American?” he asked.

    “General, you are no longer a prisoner of war. You’re going back to the States,” Lamar responded.

    Wainwright, however, was conflicted. He had survived over three years of brutal captivity and was afraid of what his fellow Americans thought of him. Would he return to the United States in disgrace and live the remainder of his life in shame?

    Wainwright responded slowly, his voice cracking with emotion, and asked the question he had agonized over for three terrible years. “What do the people in the States think of me?”

    “You’re considered a hero,” Lamar replied. The tired old general nodded silently but was still not convinced.

    It’s one thing to be found and technically free; it was a whole other adventure getting out of there, which involved three days traveling over 100 miles avoiding rogue Japanese infantry, working with uncooperative Russian troops driving U.S. military vehicles that got stuck in the mud, and riding in a train that derailed.

    On the August 31, Wainwright landed in Yokohama to meet with General MacArthur. Wainwright was apprehensive, fearing his old commander’s reaction to the general who had surrendered American armed forces in the Philapeens to the Japanese. When MacArthur spotted the weary old soldier, he rushed across a crowded dining room and embraced him. The tough veteran soldiers fought back tears, and spoke in whispers for several moments.

    Per Wikipedia: He later received the Medal of Honor, an honor which had first been proposed early in his captivity, in 1942, but was rejected due to the vehement opposition of General MacArthur, who felt that Corregidor should not have been surrendered. MacArthur did not oppose the renewed proposal in 1945.

    Wainwright retired on 31 August 1947, upon reaching the mandatory retirement age of 64, stating that he was reluctant to do so. He became a Freemason in May 1946 at Union Lodge No. 7. in Junction City, Kansas, and a Shriner soon after. He died of a stroke in San Antonio, Texas on 2 September 1953, aged. Wainwright was buried in Arlington National Cemetery, next to his wife and near his parents. Present during the funeral were Omar Bradley, George Marshall, and Edward King, with a conspicuous absence of MacArthur.

    One other thing I discovered about the Formal Japanese Surrender on the deck of the USS Missouri. As the Japanese are led away the victors put on one final display of Triumph: 1,500 planes, Boeing Superfortresses and navy fighters roar across the sky

  • When I woke up and checked my phone, a San Antonio woman from one of the dating apps sent me a message complimenting me on my smile. When the church service ended yesterday, I was chatting with one of my peers from Sunday school when a stranger tapped me on the shoulder and said, “I’m sorry to interrupt, but I just wanted to let you know you have a beautiful smile.” I guess that’s enough for me to confirm that I actually have a nice smile, and it hasn’t been an easy throwaway compliment over the years.
  • Two commercials made me audibly laugh, or as the kids would say, LOL. It was the Matthew McConaughey Mike Ditka commercial and the one with the bald guy sitting on his couch with his head painted as if he was wearing a football helmet.

  • Ever wonder what snow in the swamp would look like? This is 5 miles into the Louisiana swamps in the Atchafalaya basin… it’s unreal… having lived down there for the first 28 years of my life, we never saw anything like this.

    Smashed records.

    Curtesy of Garrett Roberts.

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    — Erin Reed (@erininthemorning.com) January 25, 2025 at 3:56 PM

  • The Rocky IV training montage gets me every time, and I thought this spoof of it with a Buffalo Bills game was great. I just wish the Bills would have won. This upcoming Super Bowl is going to be painful to watch. I’m not sure if it’s a double-edge sword or a real sister kisser.

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Your Bag of Nothing for Thursday, January 22, 2025

  • The inauguration was only four days ago. This week has felt like a month already. The new administration is going to age all of at a faster rate than normal.
  • And so it starts: A House Republican on Thursday introduced a proposed change to the Constitution that would allow President Trump to seek a third term in office.

    The amendment has virtually no chance of becoming ratified but it is a marker of the depths of fealty the new president enjoys within the House GOP.

    • Republican House members have rushed to introduce bills that would codify Trump’s vision for expanding the U.S. borders by acquiring Greenland and the Panama Canal,
    • The measure is an extreme long-shot: It would need a two-thirds vote in both chambers of Congress and be ratified by 38 states to be added to the Constitution.
    • Ogles’ amendment would allow any president to serve a third term if their first two terms were non-consecutive.
    • The text of the amendment would still prohibit a third term if the first two were consecutive — prohibiting former Presidents Bush, Obama, and Clinton from running again — or a third full term for anyone who has served more than two years of someone else’s term.
  • Less than half of Fort Worth ISD students can read at grade level, district reveals
  • Aide to House Speaker Johnson advised against subpoena of Jan. 6 witness over concerns about ‘sexual texts’ from lawmakers
    • An aide to House Speaker Mike Johnson advised Republican colleagues against subpoenaing former White House aide Cassidy Hutchinson as part of their investigation into the Jan. 6, 2021, attack in an effort to prevent the release of sexually explicit texts that lawmakers sent her, according to written correspondence reviewed by The Washington Post and a person familiar with the effort.
  • From The Wall Street Journal (paywall): How Much Is Your College Football Team Worth?
    • The Ohio State Buckeyes were just crowned the best team in the country. According to an analysis of what each team would be worth on the open market, they’re also the most valuable program in the sport.
    • The valuation considers factors such as revenue, growth, cash flow, and sustainability, and accounts for the recent changes in college sports, including the introduction of player compensation.

  • David Byrne and Choir! Choir! Choir! singing David Bowie’s Heroes is exactly what I needed to hear tonight
    youtu.be/w7HJZPlJn_U?…

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    — Eric Stangel (@ericstangel.bsky.social) January 23, 2025 at 9:17 PM

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Your Bag of Randomness for Wednesday, January 21, 2025

  • Yup, Billy Crystal and Meg Ryan had a little get-together and posted this photo and, I guess, teasing a When Harry Met Sally Super Bowl commercial. She’s 63, he’s 76. I didn’t realize they were that far apart in age.
    • “It’s finally happening, we’re reuniting for something iconic. Can’t wait to show you all soon,” Ryan captioned the joint post.
  • Allegedly, Twitter is full of bots that defend Jerry Jones.
  • Everyone familiar with the Terminator franchise felt uneasy reading this and immediately thought of Skynet.
    • Trump said the investment will create a new company, called Stargate, to grow artificial intelligence infrastructure in the United States. The leaders of SoftBank, OpenAI and Oracle stood alongside Trump during the announcement. Their respective companies will invest $100 billion in total for the project to start, with plans to pour up to $500 billion into Stargate in the coming years. 
    • My initial thought is that this is a very good thing for the United States to set itself up as the AI leader. AI is the next big thing. However, the potential of AI scares me, and this comes from a guy who has numerous paid subscriptions to AI services. Not to mention, I don’t have a lot of faith in the Trump administration to manage something like this.
    • I thought only U.S. companies would be involved, but SoftBank is a Japanese company.
    • MGX is also a big player and another foreign company.
      • It was reported in June that the UAE, with roughly $2 trillion in sovereign wealth funds, aims to reduce its dependence on oil by establishing itself as a world center for AI. This goal led to the creation of MGX.
    • The article says the first data center will be in Texas. Curious, I researched, thinking it would probably be Austin, near Elon’s home. DFW is home to a lot of data centers, or maybe one of the other major cities like Houston or San Antonio. Nope. The first data center will be in Abilene. The data center in Abilene, Texas, is being constructed within the Lancium Clean Compute Campus, which spans approximately 800 acres northwest and just outside the city limits. That creates enormous opportunities for their three universities: ACU, Hardin-Simmons, and McMurry. I’m thinking that having internship possibilities at the data center would be a huge recruiting tool for college students interested in a technology career.
  • These Texas pastors believe God sent Trump to save America from sin
  • Today is Norah O’Donnell’s as anchor of the CBS Evening News, which is my preferred network because I like most of their correspondents. Thank goodness. She’s equal parts histrionic and egotistical. I’m looking forward to John Dickerson, who’s dry but he is full of substance. He really knows his stuff. But he’s sharing the duties with Maurice DuBois who I don’t know much about but feel he’s a bit posh. But I will give O’Donnell credit for moving the headquarters from NYC to DC since that’s where most of the news is made and the people in power are.
  • For some reason, I started to research jobs in meteorology. I’ve noticed several people have used it as a second career, and those on television are just a tiny segment of the job market. However, per weather.com (PDF):
    • The number of new, traditional, entry-level positions has not been increasing along with the number of meteorologists entering the workforce, nor is it expected to in the next few years. Trends suggest there will be an increasing oversupply of meteorology graduates in the coming years, and that some meteorologists will have a difficult time finding a traditional weather-related job.
  • I reflected on the JFK: What the Doctors Saw (2023) documentary I watched during the winter break about the doctors at Parkland Hospital who worked on the slain president and the priest who administered the last rights. Hearing news of the event, Father Oscar Huber and a few others drove to the hospital since Parkland was in his parish. They were stopped by officials twice but waved by when they said they were clergy and told where to park, where he was led straight to the ER. He walked in and uncovered the white sheet over President Kennedy’s face, giving him the last rights. When Jackie asked the priest about the last rights, he told her he had given conditional absolution, causing her to grimace. Conditional absolution is a form of last rites given when a priest is unsure if the recipient is still alive but administers the sacrament in case the soul can benefit from it. Jackie felt conditional absolution underscored the tragic and chaotic circumstances of his death, and above all, he was obviously dead. He attempted to console Jackie, assuring her that her husband’s spirit had not yet left his body. I later read in an interview (JFK Library PDF) that he leaned into the thought that the spirit lingers in the body for a bit after physical death but is not sure for how long, so in his view, he couldn’t be sure the president was dead despite the head wound, blood everywhere, and brain matter on the floor. Outside—and despite Secret Service warnings to keep quiet—Huber became among the first unofficial sources to reveal that JFK had indeed died. Though Huber denied it afterward, Time Magazine’s Hugh Sidey reported Huber responding, “He’s dead all right” to a question about the president’s condition.
  • Just an ordinary day in Australia.

     

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