• Pete Hegseth may be the only person I’ve ever seen that may have peaked in the 7th or 8th grade. I may be exaggerating a little, but not by much. I just think he is indicative of this toxic masculine culture that indoctrinates young men and makes them all sociopathic, misogynistic incels. The warrior ethos is just his kink. That’s honestly the thing that I think will cause the most long-term damage: When you have trash humans in positions of power who have their horrible behavior on daily public display, it gives some people permission to be horrible to the people in their worlds. That’s a cancer that spreads, and it’s going to take a long time to fix that.
  
  I’m not sure we can.

• If I could be said to have any religion at all, it would most likely be Catholicism, as that’s the one I grew up in. My grandparents were so Catholic that meat was forbidden on Fridays even though that was never a thing outside of Lent since 1966. However, in the words of George Carlin, “I used to be Catholic, now I’m an American. You know, you grow…”
  
  Even when I was at the worst part of my “God is dead and no one cares”, phase in my teens and twenties, I never–NEVER–had a bad word to say about John Paul II, especially early young Commie Killer Karol, JP2. Maybe I should have, looking back at it. We gave Sinead no end of shit, but it turns out we really did her dirty. That said, I never would have tried to Popesplain the man. That leads me to a question that’s been on my mind all day: What in the liturgical fuck was Couch McEyeliner thinking? What the fuck was the Preacher of the House thinking? My brothers in Christ, are you insane? I mean, I understand if Ratzinger was more your speed, but C’mon.  
  
  It’s the arrogance for me, dude. Here’s a story from 20-ish years ago: I was working for a contractor for Verizon, selling and servicing DSL for the home. I was a workforce guy back then, and I worked with this guy named Rich. Rich was a born again Christian, assistant pastor at one of the many strip malls of the Lord we have around here. This is fall of 2004, my grandmother is not long for the world, and I’m really broken up about it. I ended up talking about this with Rich one morning, and he asked what religion she was. I said Catholic, he said I’m sorry, I repeated myself, and he said “I heard you, I said I was sorry.” He meant he was sorry my grandmother was Catholic. I flew over the cubicle wall at this motherfucker, and they literally had to drag me away. The fucking balls on this guy. They moved me to another building in the complex to keep me from strangling this asshole, thankfully there were other people who heard this exchange and stood up for me. If you ever needed any justification on why some people think Evangelicals are trash human beings, let that be Exhibit A. This story ends exactly how you think it ends. Rich disappeared. He didn’t quit. He was arrested. He was incarcerated. Would you like to guess why? I bet you can get it in one. 
  
  The Pope doesn’t need anyone’s advice, especially those two jackballs. Why don’t you have a Coke, a smile, and a fucking seat.
  
  
  

• LINK: Apple is making AI glasses
  
  There was a time when I would jump at this. I would not get these today if they came out as described here. Cameras on glasses are a dealbreaker for me. Ideally, these should be for inward use. Information that shows up in the lens, connection to your phone, headphones. I really think the so-called market should speak loudly on this. You might make the argument that you have no right to privacy in a public place, and while that may be true, I think there might be an ethical question here. I think there’s a difference between holding up a phone and recording someone and using a camera embedded in a pair of glasses, especially if someone covers the light that has usually been included on those glasses to indicate the camera is on.
• El Naranja: The only people who believe that the photo you posted and deleted was supposed to be you as a doctor have no idea what context is. When you post an insane diatribe about the Pope, and then post that picture, there is no other conclusion a person could make.
  
  Unless, of course, that person is stupid.
• I’m continuing to redecorate the studio. It’s going slow, but it’s going. I have concepts of a plan.
  
  I mean: At 5pm Eastern on 4/13/2026, there are concepts of a plan. Card subject to change, your mileage may vary, thank you come again.

• I started watching Markwayne this morning, moved over to Tulsi, and turned it all off after about 10 minutes total. I just can’t. I wish I could tell you that this is a MAGA thing, but it’s not. It’s that these oversight hearings…aren’t. The legislators want their sound bites for the news, and the cabinet members/witnesses don’t answer anything. Also, they want sound bites too. I know, that’s the world we live in. That doesn’t stop me from wanting people to start getting held in contempt for not answering questions right there. Three or four cabinet members spending the night in lockup ought to start people thinking about their choices.
  
• Looking forward to seeing what Kat Abughazaleh does next. We need a lot more like her. A lot more. I know that may I lose some folks for that. That’s OK. Kat lines up more with my beliefs these days than anyone else. I’ve somehow found myself in the Bernie/AOC/Kat side of things, and I don’t see that changing anytime soon.
  
  Some of you will remember that I was a Republican in my 20s and early 30s. I am not a Republican today. There is a reason for that, and my moving to the left isn’t it. I didn’t move very far, if at all.
  
• What if I do a podcast of what I put here? I mean, I little more than that, but that sounds a little more reasonable, and maybe doable.

• Happy 1st bullshit excuse to get hammered day of the year to those who celebrate.
• I am never listening to these weather people ever again. Every single time some weather event gets hyped up as epic and dangerous and full of bad juju, it’s a wet fart in a hurricane. Nothing happened here in Virginia Beach that we don’t get in the Spring already. T-Storms, heavy rain, that’s it. No hurricane force winds, nothing. What bullshit.
  
• LINK: “Gamblers trying to win a bet on Polymarket are vowing to kill me if I don’t rewrite an Iran missile story”
  
  Pete Rose was a fucking Boy Scout compared to these ghouls.
  
• LINK: The MacBook Neo is the fantastic new Mac for the masses
  
  I know a lot of people who have been waiting for years to see a “budget” MacBook. Looks like this knocks it out of the park, but I think they can go further. Make the budget iPhone (right now the 17e) the iPhone Neo. Make the Apple Watch SE the Watch Neo. Make Neo a whole new line of budget devices.
  
• I don’t know what had me thinking that something would change after Joe Kent resigned this morning, but El Naranja is going to play to type. Kent’s going to get doxxed, he’s going to get threats, and he’s going to get “investigated”. The man survives on Big Macs, Diet Coke, and petty revenge.
  
• Last thing for today: Being something adjacent to an Anglophile, I find a lot of UK stuff fascinating. Not the Monarchy, but other than that… I love watching the House of Commons, Prime Minister’s Questions every Wednesday, I have been known to flip on Sky News for something closer to news than what we get here. You may have heard of ITV, Independent Television. The history of it is amazing. Bob The Fish Productions made a series about the history of the various regional stations that made up ITV until they mostly merged under one name. I strongly encourage you to watch this. Partly for the history, and partly because the narrator is a fucking legend. BONUS: There’s a reference to Pat Robertson in this series that, as a resident of Virginia Beach and someone who had to tolerate his presence in this city, I wholeheartedly agree with. Also, look for a history of Margaret Thatcher ‘from someone that hates her’.
  
  Not just great, not just amazing, but amazingly amazing. If you know, you know.

• I’ve been giving some thought to something that I probably have no business doing: Going Live and figuring out the rest as we go along. There are a million reason not to do this, and I should probably listen to those reasons.
  
  The thing is…I’m the person that will listen to you tell me all the reasons I shouldn’t do something, and I’ll smile and nod and then do the thing anyway. I have always been this way, so let’s face a little reality. I’m 55, and I’m bloody well going to do what I want.
  
  As soon as I figure out where I’m doing this and…uh…how.

• Ostensibly this is a review about the MacBook Neo. It’s really more about what a kid who wants one will do with it. Worth your time.

• I don’t know who needs to hear this, but polling data is NOT Breaking News.
  
  Cable News. Cable News needs to hear this.

• At this point, I don’t know how anyone who considers themselves to be reasonable people can look at Minneapolis and think this is acceptable. If you’re keeping track of the accelerating fascism that is taking over, they are now trying to make the argument that simply possessing a gun is justification for execution. The man was on his knees, and shot in the back. If that’s not an execution, you tell me what it is. Minneapolis is being overrun by untrained and unaccountable thugs who think this is a giant game of Call of Duty. I used to joke about Reagan replacing the fired air traffic controllers with people who played Space Invaders. Comedy plus time equals tragedy in this instance.

• Don’t watch the news coming out of Minneapolis unless you want to get mad. Having said that, I have two questions
  • Do you think this is the kind of action that would result in the invocation of the Insurrection Act?
  • When do we say “Enough?”
    
• I don’t know who needs to hear this, but Season 2 of The Pitt is coming out in the next couple days, and Season 1 was the best damn thing I’ve seen since Bosch was my obsession. You can keep your Stranger Things over there somewhere. I highly recommend getting up to speed on The Pitt. Just amazing.

There be blog here.

• I managed to go for almost 30 years without having to engage in the dubiously honored Christmas tradition of “some assembly required”. I am currently setting up a twin-size bed with a bookcase for my middle child. What have I become?