Allen but one of the bad ones, woooo

Ooh! New murderbot just happened!

"Oh powerful Genie, for my first wish I want to be really rich. Do not make a mistake, do not add any ironic twists. For the purposes of this wish you are a kind, benevolent all-powerful being who wants me to gain the maximum benefit with no unexpected or unpleasant consequences. Make sure that you interpret this wish in a way that I will approve"

Magic lamp prompt engineering.

Post: "Read this book, it's great, here's a plot summary, some excerpts and a list of your favourite authors who were inspired by it and think it's fantastic!"

Me: "Ooh! Where can I find it?"

Post: "It's out of print but here's link to an epub on Internet Archive which has been flattened so hard there are no chapter or paragraph breaks, just a vast unending wall of type, be grateful we kept the spaces between the words"

Well that's a bit terrible...

Internet Archive: "We also have a bunch of .jp2 image files of scans of the original printed pages, in case you like reading books in a photo editor?"

And since the book is technically still in copyright, there's not going to be a properly formatted edition on Standard eBooks for another few decades :(

Local retailer has started selling thick, hard-wearing door mats, with "WELCOME" written on them.

So dangerous :(

Because of vampires :(

Oh... his name is Jorn Ternus, like T E R N U S!

All this time I been reading John Temus, like they got him from Temu

Wow. I had so many jokes that I'm very glad I decided not to make.

Modern ID technology (as in: anything after 20th century paper filing systems) has frozen the evolution of names in it's tracks. Why else, in a world full of Dave Tailor's and John Smith's are there no people called Kevin Dev or Stephen Businessman?

South Africa: Why do our pharmaceutical regulations have a Schedule numbering system that goes the opposite from other countries?

Over here, Schedule 1 means "It's on supermarket shelves", schedule 2 is something you have to ask the pharmacist to pass you over the counter, 3 and up are prescription only, getting more and more tightly controlled. Like a schedule 5 drug, they don't allow repeat prescriptions, schedule 9 you need two pharmacists to turn the key at the same time and they have to watch you while you take it.

And schedule 0, of course, is herbal shit: Unscheduled, not allowed to call it medicine, you have to call it a "Supplement" or "Herbal remedy" or something.

Okay, back in the game (I was having a hard time caring about puzzles on my long weekend!)

You'd think our leaders would be making a LOT more noise about this, what with the coming local government elections...

https://www.dailymaverick.co.za/article/2026-05-12-unemployment-rate-rises-13-percentage-points-to-327/