Bag of Nothing

The 1991 P.M. Dawn hit Set Adrift on Memory Bliss randomly started to play on my 90s and 2000s playlist while I was driving the other day. Great song (Baby you send me, baby you send me…), and I totally forgot Christina Applegate is mentioned in it. Briefly, I wondered how she has been doing since her health has declined dramatically.  Then, the next day, I saw an article that she had been rushed to a hospital in Europe.

Currently has 95% on Rotten Tomatoes & has been called one of the most heartbreaking horror films of 2025. Good Boy releases in theaters on October 3, 2025.

Count me out – A horror movie shot from the perspective of a dog who sees its owner haunted by supernatural entities. Even though it’s obviously fiction, I’m just too much of a sympathetic lover of canines. But I give the director a lot of credit for using a real dog.

There’s this trend I’ve been seeing on profile pictures of women on dating apps that has been a turnoff for me. Now I know it’s called Love Island Face. Here’s a good description of it:

“Usually, the lips are full (often as a result of hyaluronic acid fillers), noses tend to be narrow, foreheads are virtually motionless, and cheeks are plumped and sculpted.”

So Why Do People Over 35 Find This Unsettling?

From Dr. Sturm’s POV, it’s visual and visceral: “People over 35 don’t like the look that you can tell had work done. We see the beauty of a natural youthful face. You can’t go back to being 20 with flawless skin, but if you spend that time of your life with too many injectables, it’s like lost time to us.” She also warns that the look doesn’t age well. “They already look older, and we’ll continue to see filler migration and filler blindness”—a phenomenon where people don’t notice their own filler anymore and keep adding more.

Lawmakers want to end HR ghosting during the interview process—here’s how

Geoff Duncan, who served as Lieutenant Governor of Georgia from 2019 to 2023 as a Republican and stood up to President Trump to discredit his state’s election results, announced that he’s officially swapping sides to join the Democrats.

Duncan explained in an op-ed that being a Democrat will put him in the “best possible position each day to love my neighbor.” In the op-ed, published Tuesday in The Atlanta-Journal Constitution, Duncan explained that the quest to love his neighbor guided him in office and that GOP policies on healthcare, immigration, and gun reform have strayed from that moral imperative.

Read it at The Hill

The White House Rose Garden has had a massive revamp. President Trump said it was mainly due to bad drainage and chairs getting stuck after their legs poked into the grass.

Across the street, the White House Historical Association recently unveiled its life-size replica of President Trump’s Oval Office from his first term. I got a kick out of the detail that went into it:

It is strikingly similar to how Mr. Trump had the room set up back then, with many of the objects 3-D printed to mimic the real thing. The books on each shelf are the same and sit in the same position. The portraits, though printed instead of painted, appear identical. So does the Reagan-era beige rug and Frederic Remington’s “Bronco Buster” statuette

“We used a lot of the same vendors that do work at the White House,” Mr. Boorady said, citing the people who installed the floors and upholstered the furniture. (Mr. Trump’s sofas were first used by President George W. Bush.) “In fact, when they came, they noted, ‘Hey, you’re off a half-inch here, a quarter-inch off here.’”

Of course, not everything can be exactly the same. The Resolute Desk has only one phone instead of two, because visitors kept tangling the lines. Unlike the real Oval Office, there is no bust of Abraham Lincoln, as it would block the exhibit’s accessible entrance.

Of course, Trump has recently updated the Oval Office with a lot of gold.

Back in the days, presidents who were from wealth tried to be understated. Some did it to relate to the common everyday voter, but for others, it was just who they were.

Oh wow dusty up in here now….Florida Panther Mackie Samoskevish grew up in Sandy Hook, CT, brought the Stanley Cup to the Sandy Hook Elementary School Memorial for his day with the cup.

“I thought we’d just bring it back in honor of them”

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— WuTangIsForTheChildren (@wutangforchildren.bsky.social) August 4, 2025 at 2:30 PM

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Bag of Nothing

While watching something on PlutoTV, I saw my first Halloween commercial of the year. It was from HomeGoods.

If you know me well, then it’s no surprise I watched the rebooted The Naked Gun this weekend. Thankfully, I watched it with a close friend. In high school and college, we watched the original on VHS several hundred times. I no longer go into these movies with the expectation of whether it’s going to be better or worse than the original. Now, I just like to be entertained and see what they can do with the source material and make it their own. Overall, I’d say it was pretty solid. I was pleasantly surprised it wasn’t raunchy at all.

It’s official, I’m old.

I had a job interview scheduled last Monday that I was really looking forward to, especially since it dealt with my background and the emerging AI field. It was the one in which I had to take a two-and-a-half-hour assessment that I mentioned before. Wearing a nice dress shirt and sport coat, I log into the Microsoft Teams meeting a few minutes early. Surprised the meeting hadn’t started after a few minutes past the scheduled time, I checked my email, where I found this in my Inbox:

OK, no big deal, stuff happens. I replied, saying sure, and I was available the rest of the afternoon or would be happy to reschedule for the next day or a later time in the week. Not hearing back from her on Monday or Tuesday, I followed up with another message to touch base on Wednesday. The rest of the week goes by without me hearing a word. However, on Sunday, I received a message thanking me for taking the time to interview with them, and while I was talented, they decided to go with another applicant.

I struggled to get excited about the other interview I had scheduled last week with a different company because it was with an AI avatar. At first, it asked me some basic questions, and I’d reply as if I were talking to a computerized customer service phone tree. It asked if I had any questions, so I tested the system by asking some non-generic questions and was slightly impressed at the detailed, customized answer. As it started to ask me more challenging and complex questions, I changed my demeanor and spoke to it as if it were a real human. After each question, it would then audibly summarize my answer and then move on to the next question. It was hard to get a feel for how I did overall. I am curious how a hiring manager will get the results of my answers. Will he just listen to an audio recording of what I said, receive a summary created by the AI interviewing tool, or something else?

Someone told me the State of Texas is doing a lot of hiring, so I’m going to explore that.

A USA Today exposé on the Dallas Stars – ‘They control everything’: How the Dallas Stars monopolized Texas youth hockey

Unlike the NFL, NBA and MLB, a handful of NHL teams are intimately involved in running the youth levels of their sports in their regions – perhaps none more than the Stars. In Dallas, the Stars spent decades turning what was once seen as a community good into a lucrative arm of their for-profit enterprise.

This whole Sydney Sweeney “controversy” is stupid. Very, very, stupid. And, I have a feeling Micah Parsons isn’t going anywhere. But if he does, I’m sure he’d prefer to go to Washington to play for his old coach, but I’d like to see him in Buffalo.

Texas lawmakers unveiled a proposed redistricting map this week. The map shifts several districts that are currently held by Democrats.

Thirteen-year-old BoyGeeding wanted to cook dinner for us this weekend. He took it seriously, even making his own alfredo sauce instead of opting for a premade version in a jar.

Good point.

I think Willow Bend is the newest mall in the area, opening 24 years ago yesterday. It’s looking pretty barren.

I visited the mall today 8.3.25 and it is not looking too well. There were a lot of vacant spaces. The food court is completely devoid. Probably 75% of level 2 was vacant.
byu/MrTacocaT12345 inDallas

Here’s a summary of the drama that’s going on in The Ticket’s subreddit.

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Bag of Nothing

A good friend asked if I could pick him up from a place at six in the morning in Dallas, which was just a 20-minute drive down I-35 for me. I thought nothing of it, but I forgot how aggressive morning commuters can be. Traffic wasn’t congested or anything, but it was as if everyone was driving as if they were 10 minutes late getting to wherever they were going, and all their blinkers had become inoperable.

That’s one way to create a lasting legacy. Unlike flagpoles, a 90,000 square feet $200 million ballroom can’t be uprooted. Naturally, it will forever be referred to as the Trump Ballroom.

Trump is building a new $200 million ballroom at the White House

Honestly, I support this and think it makes sense. This sort of thing is Trump’s bread and butter. Not to mention, he’s right, always having to host an event inside a tent is a bit unbefitting for a president to host large-scale events. The East Wing currently accommodates 200 seated people; this ballroom will have a seated capacity of 650 people.

And the Secret Service will love the idea, as it will make security much easier as opposed to hosting an event away from the White House. What shocks me is that President Trump didn’t make the announcement himself; it’s his sort of thing to be in such a spotlight. And it appears they are going about it the right way, with donors fitting the bill instead of taxpayers.

In a press release, the White House said Trump has held several meetings with members of the White House staff, the National Park Service, the White House Military Office, and the United States Secret Service to discuss design features and planning.

“The President and the Trump White House are “fully committed to working with the appropriate organizations to preserve the special history of the white House, while building a beautiful ballroom that can be enjoyed by future administrations and generations of Americans to come,” White House chief of staff Susie Wiles said.

Construction starts soon, this September. I haven’t found anything about a planned completion date, but surely it will be completed before the president’s term. But then again, who knows when he’s leaving office? It is interesting to imagine the stress and pressure the builder will have to come in on budget and on time.

This headline reads like Godzilla’s next big brawl is about to break out.

Radioactive wasp nest found at site where US once made nuclear bombs

Workers at a site in South Carolina that once made key parts for nuclear bombs in the United States have found a radioactive wasp nest but officials said there is no danger to anyone.

Employees who routinely check radiation levels at the Savannah River Site near Aiken found a wasp nest on July 3 on a post near tanks where liquid nuclear waste is stored, according to a report from the US Department of Energy.

The nest had a radiation level 10 times what is allowed by federal regulations, officials said.

The workers sprayed the nest with insect killer, removed it and disposed of it as radioactive waste. No wasps were found, officials said.

I’m not sure how it came about, but during crosstalk with the Musers yesterday, they wondered when an actor’s voice is dubbed in another language, if it’s always the same actor. Several years ago, on a flight, I watched a wonderful documentary about the 24 voice actors who dubbed George Clooney’s movies in their respective languages, Being George Clooney. Here’s the trailer.

Toy Story 2 almost never happened and was saved after being deleted twice.

Pixar was putting the finishing touches on what would become one of its most beloved films. A slip-up deleted the entire movie from the studio’s servers. To make it worse, the backup system had quietly failed. One employee, working from home while caring for her newborn, happened to have an offline backup on her personal computer, saving the project from total annihilation.

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Bag of Nothing

I was enjoying the Happy Gilmore sequel last night when all of a sudden I heard BoyGeeding yell for me, “Dad! Come here!” Immediately, I got up from the couch and headed to his room, where I found he had set out a chair for me, his Xbox booted up to start a new game of Madden, and his arm stretched out to me with a controller in his hand.

I told the boy that I was in the middle of watching a movie and would be back in an hour, and that next time he should schedule time with me to play games with him ahead of time. Heck no, I did no such thing! I smiled, sat down, and said, “Let’s do this, it’s been a while!”

A woman at my church, who I suspect is in her early to mid-seventies, mentioned that her father recently died. He was 102 years old and had been married to her mother for 77 years.

Kinda strange we haven’t had a 100-degree day yet this summer, but that will change this week.

Missionaries using secret audio devices to evangelise Brazil’s isolated peoples

Missionary groups are using audio devices in protected territories of the rainforest to attract and evangelise isolated or recently contacted Indigenous people in the Amazon. A joint investigation by the Guardian and Brazilian newspaper O Globo reveals that solar-powered devices reciting biblical messages in Portuguese and Spanish have appeared among members of the Korubo people in the Javari valley, near the Brazil-Peru border.

50 pounds of dynamite found in an abandoned school bus

Authorities in Alaska had to remove 50 pounds of dynamite found in an old school bus Wednesday, according to the Federal Bureau of Investigation’s Anchorage office.

Agents said the dynamite was at least 20 years old and its location near the highway made it unsafe to try to detonate the explosives there.

Great poster for the upcoming Coyote vs ACME movie due out a year from now. Here’s the premise: “After every product made by the Acme Corporation has backfired on Wile E. Coyote in his pursuit of the Road Runner, down-and-out billboard human attorney Kevin Avery represents Coyote in a lawsuit against Acme. ”

Here’s an article about it, along with a courtroom still that cracked me up.

US Sen. John Cornyn calls for ‘Alligator Alcatraz’ facility in Texas

Cornyn made the comments in reference to a new immigration detention center in the Florida Everglades that’s surrounded by swamps filled with alligators. The remote location is meant to deter illegal immigration.

Florida officials built the facility in just a few days, using heavy duty tents, trailers and temporary buildings. Right now, it can hold 3,000 people. Florida officials hope to expand it to be able to house 5,000.

Supporters say it’s a cost-effective way to carry out President Donald Trump’s mass deportation agenda.

Students build new ‘hybrid drone’ — watch it fly in the air and then seamlessly dive underwater

This is pretty cool and I can see it being used for a lot of search and rescue and military purposes. However, upon researching this, I discovered that the Chinese had already displayed this technology years ago. That kinda took the wind out of my sails.

A couple of articles about members of the political party that prides itself on family values, but are caught doing things that contradict that message.

Texas GOP Rep. Giovanni Capriglione admits affair, denies abortion allegations

A conservative news site published an interview with a woman who alleges a 17-year affair with the Southlake representative, who said this week he wouldn’t seek reelection.

Far-right Oklahoma schools head Ryan Walters had nude women on TV during meeting

An executive session of the Oklahoma State Board of Education was interrupted when images of naked women were seen on a television screen in the office of state schools Superintendent Ryan Walters, where the session was held, two board members told The Oklahoman.

Carson said the images caught her eye during the meeting. “And I was like, ‘Those are naked women,’” she said. “And then I was like, ‘No, wait a minute. Those aren’t naked, surely those aren’t naked women. Something is playing a trick on my eye. Maybe they just have on tan body suits. … This is just really bizarre.’

“I saw them just walking across the screen, and I’m like, ‘no.” I’m sorry I even have to use this language, but I’m like, ‘Those are her nipples.’ And then I’m like, ‘That’s pubic hair.’ What in the world am I watching? I didn’t watch a second longer. … I was so disturbed by it, I was like, ‘What is on your TV?’ I was very stern, like I’d been a mother or a classroom teacher. And I said, ‘What am I watching? Turn it off now!’”

Want to Shop According to Your Values? Little Blue Cart Can Help

Kate Marsh Lord and Erin Fangmann came up with a solution: In 2025, they founded Little Blue Cart, a directory that connects customers with progressive, small businesses (and yes, that includes services as well as products)

Marry me.

Great mindset. Too many of us choose not to be free.

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