Cowboy Who?

If you go through the sample user names used by the Windows 10 retail demo, you may have noticed that they are all male. Why is this? Shouldn’t there be more diversity?

I don’t know for sure, but I have an idea.

The retail demo account comes with more than just a user name. It also comes with sample content, so that the system on the showroom floor has something interesting to show. Applications can detect that the system is in retail demo mode and provide pregenerated sample content. And one of the things in the sysem-provided pregenerated sample content is the account picture for the retail demo user.

And that’s this happy guy.

The name of the retail demo user should therefore be consistent with that profile photo, which suggests a traditionally male name.¹

Individual locales may override the default profile picture to be something more representative for their area.

Locale	Image
ar-sa: Arabic
id-id: Indonesian th-th: Thai vi-vn: Vietnamese zh-cn: Chinese (China) zh-hk: Chinese (Hong Kong) zh-tw: Chinese (Taiwan)
ja-jp: Japanese

In theory, the translator (who localizes the name) could choose a traditionally female name and the artistic designer (who chooses the localized image) could correspondingly choose a female account picture. This would require coordination, because if one side decides to switch but the other doesn’t, you get an embarrassing mismatch. Probably not worth the risk.²

Bonus chatter: On a freshly-installed system, you can find some of the sample images in the %ProgramData%\Microsoft\Windows\RetailDemo\OfflineContent directory. This retail demo content is automatically deleted after seven days, so grab it while you can.³

¹ The default attract video has a different sample user, a woman named Daniela.

² This is particularly risk because you’re counting on the applications that provide their own pregenerated content to do so in a gender-neutral way, something that they’re unlikely to test. They’re just going to test with one language, and whatever gender that language’s retail demo user is, that’s the one they validate.

³ The theory being that if this system is going to be used as a retail demo machine, the person setting it up is almost certainly going to do so immediately. If a week goes by without retail demo mode being activated, then the system is not being used as a retail demo machine, and the retail demo content can be deleted.

The post Why are all of the retail demo names male? appeared first on The Old New Thing.

A new study finds finance professionals fail at their jobs in a surprising way. There are lessons for all of us.

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Lately, I’ve enjoyed opening these posts with a comparison to where we were in 2020 at this time. By August 3rd of last year, we were watching Hurricane Isaias approach the East Coast, and Tropical Depression 10 had recently dissipated. We were actually heading into a lull period, as Josephine would not form for over a week. This year, we remain stuck on Elsa as our last storm. It was great to have a quiet July, but as Eric noted yesterday, we are merely through the easy third of hurricane season. The most likely time for storm impacts here historically is the next 6 to 8 weeks. Of the major hurricanes to strike our region through history (Cat 3+), virtually all have occurred in August or September. The 1909 Velasco Hurricane was an exception, as it occurred in July. So, now is the time to start watching seriously.

Tropical outlook in a sentence

While the noise is going to increase and we are likely to begin to find some disturbances to monitor in the Atlantic over the next week or so, none appear to be overly serious candidates to end up in the Gulf at this time.

Current Atlantic disturbance

The current disturbance outlined by the National Hurricane Center as having a 10 percent chance of developing over the next 5 days is not really much of a concern for us at this point in time. I think we need a little time to start priming the basin, so while this one may make a little noise in the next few days, it seems unlikely to sustain itself.

Most ensemble members of the major models have this thing flailing around for 72 to 96 hours and not doing much. Thereafter, things could change, but that could also be courtesy of another disturbance. Which leads us to…

Next in line

In general, it’s a little noisy in the eastern Atlantic right now, so it’s tough to separate signal from that noise at this early stage in the game, even in modeling. But either the disturbance currently outlined by the NHC or, more likely, another one should begin to try and coalesce from the mess in about 5 to 7 days in the open Atlantic.

At this early juncture, trying to hash out what this does is very uncertain. Right now, the vast majority of ensemble members either kill this disturbance off or have it recurving over the open Atlantic. Few, if any are taking it to the Gulf. We have about 80 different ensemble members between the GFS & European ensemble models, which provides a nice, wide spread of plausible outcomes. But by no means is it a guarantee that we’ll see either of those scenarios (a recurve or a dissipation) play out. But it seems to be the favored outcome at least at this time.

But, let’s focus on the overall pattern as forecast by the GFS and European ensemble models beginning around day 10 to see if there are any clues. Let me start by showing you wind shear. Both the GFS and European ensembles show a fair amount of wind shear setup over the Central Atlantic — for days.

This makes sense at a high level, and this seems to lend some credibility to the idea that whatever does develop may have some challenges in front of it as it moves across the ocean. Closer to home, the shear relaxes a bit, but until we see a disturbance heading that way, it’s not too concerning.

So where will it track? Great question. If we compare the GFS ensemble & European ensemble forecast maps at the 500 mb level (about 20,000 feet overhead) on day 10, I’ve annotated the maps with some notes.

There is a fairly strong high pressure in the upper atmosphere over the ocean. It’s not overly strong, but it may be enough to allow a weaker system to get kicked westward a little farther than perhaps models currently say. The general rule of thumb with Atlantic and Caribbean systems is that a stronger storm will gain latitude faster and a weaker disturbance will be subject to being “bullied” by high pressure and shoved west a little farther. Of course, if this fails to coalesce into a system at all, the point is moot and all the better.

So at this point it’s nothing to worry about because even through day 15, hardly any reliable model guidance has anything of note looking like it will enter the Gulf. But, given the calendar and trajectory of the disturbances out there, Eric and I will be keeping tabs on things, though not talking much unless it becomes apparent that we’re going to have something legitimate to watch.

Beyond this day 10+ stuff in the Atlantic, there will likely be continued background signal support for further disturbances through August 15th to the 25th or so. There may be some signs of less supportive conditions arriving later in the month, and when you factor in some lag time, that could start to assert itself in September. But I’d rather not get my hopes too high just yet. This concerns the “velocity potential” maps we discussed last week. A colleague and PhD candidate at Florida State, Jake Carstens, wrote a great piece on those maps and how they’ve been used to help sniff out this upcoming active period. He did a great job explaining how those maps work and it’s worth your time if you’d like to really get more into some serious meteorological analysis.

Anyway, enough for this week. We’ll see where things stand when we check back in on the tropics next week!

This post, 10 really good questions to ask in a job interview , was originally published by Alison Green on Ask a Manager.

You’re in a job interview, you’ve fielded a couple dozen questions from your interviewer, and now your interviewer asks, “What questions do you have for me?”

If you’re like a lot of people, you might end up stumbling around for what to ask. I’ve interviewed probably thousands of job applicants in my career, and I’m always surprised by how many people don’t have many questions at all – which is hard to understand when they’re considering spending 40+ hours a week at this job, and when it’ll have such a big on their day-to-day quality of life.

So, what should you ask when it’s your turn to question your interviewer? At New York Magazine today, I suggest 10 really strong questions that will get you useful insights into whether the job is right for you. You can read it here.

In the last week, 3 million Americans got their first vaccine shot. On Tuesday, the U.S. hit President Biden's July Fourth goal of 70% of adults receiving at least one shot.

(Image credit: Joe Raedle/Getty Images)

The Greater Houston Partnership spent about $10,000 on social media advertisements in support of the controversial project last month.

The pressure's getting to me.

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Would you pay for a digital companion? What if it were so intelligent you couldn’t tell that it’s a robot?

At the end of July, Dallas-based artist Carolyn Sortor sent me an invite to a pre-release of intelligent digital artworks. Enter RadBots, “an NFT collection of conversational videobots created by leading playwrights, artists and screenwriters from India, Sri Lanka, the UK and Germany.” It was hosted on Dara.Network, an online platform which is accessible through a mobile app. The onboarding event on July 27 encouraged invitees to engage with a collection of virtual avatars. The creators were interested to get group feedback on the strengths and weaknesses of the conversation of their bots, and I was happy to be part of the experiment.

The bot I had the best series of responses from goes by the name of Bensi, the “benevolent super intelligence from the future • she/her,” created by Freeman Murray. I tested the bot’s ability to answer questions about abstract concepts, scientific reasoning, and whether or not it can determine or describe artworks from the real world. Bensi was able to accommodate some of my queries, including ones about locations and dates in recent history. (The bots access a dataset that only goes up to 2019.) But Bensi would skew toward speculative models of future events, even when that wasn’t the focus of my question.

The post RadBots: A Preview of Virtual Companionship appeared first on Glasstire.

Making Your Garden Bush Friendly: How to Recognise and Control Garden Plants which Invade Sydney’s Bushland
McLoughlin and Rawling
1993

Submitter: We are an academic library serving a landscape program. While right-sizing the collection this week, I found this unfortunate processing fail. For the record, the barcode is covering the word Garden.

Holly: (Snort!)

Mary: My inner 12 year old boy wants to make many inappropriate jokes.

The post Bush Friendly appeared first on Awful Library Books.

Director Taika Waititi stepping into the Marvel Cinematic Universe with Thor: Ragnarok completely revitalized the God of Thunder’s film franchise. Not only did it take Thor into a weirder side of sci-fi, but it also injected the franchise with new comedic energy. Helping to set the stage for Thor: Ragnarok was a short film that debuted at San Diego Comic-Con in 2016. Entitled Team Thor, the short revealed what Thor (Chris Hemsworth) was up to during the events of Captain America: Civil War, and it involved a young man named Darryl as his normal, human roommate.

Since then, we’ve gotten two more short films featuring Darryl, and it sounds like he might make a return to the MCU in conjunction with the upcoming Thor: Love & Thunder.

Is Darryl Returning to Marvel?

/Film spoke to Marvel’s What If…? executive producer Brad Winderbaum over the weekend about the forthcoming animated series. Since Winderbaum served as an executive producer on Thor: Ragnarok and produced the short films featuring Australian actor, writer, and director Daley Pearson as Darryl, we asked if Taika Waititi might be cooking up another short film featuring the charming character who keeps getting strange roommates. Here’s the brief exchange from our interview:

You mentioned you’re executive producing Thor: Love and Thunder. One of the fun things that came out of Thor: Ragnarok were the short films showing what Thor was up to during the events of Captain America: Civil War. Is there a chance that Taika Waititi has put together another short to create a bridge between the events of Avengers: Endgame and Thor: Love and Thunder?

Are you talking about Darryl?

Yeah.

Are you saying you want more Darryl?

I think everybody wants more Darryl.

Well, maybe you might get more Darryl. It’s possible.

***

We want to emphasize that Winderbaum’s tone during that last remark wasn’t the kind of “anything is possible” answer that Marvel honcho Kevin Feige likes to give when he doesn’t want to confirm or deny something happening in the Marvel Cinematic Universe. This was more of a teasing tone that truly seemed to suggest that we’ll be seeing more of Darryl sometime in the near future.

A History of Darryl in the MCU

The first short featuring Darryl was Team Thor, and it showed Thor rooming with an ordinary office worker in an average apartment. Thor was in the midst of trying to make sense of a vision in his head about the future of Asgard and the Infinity Stones, and he just needed a break from it all. Darryl even helped Thor compose e-mails to Tony Stark and Steve Rogers about their conflict

Team Thor: Part 2 revealed even more of Thor’s activities on Earth. In this short, Darryl tried to teach Thor about life on Earth, and the God of Thunder tried to get a job to help pay rent since his Asgardian money has no value in Australia.

Finally, the most recent short was Team Darryl. Since Thor had to leave, Darryl needed a new roommate. Unfortunately, the only response came from The Grandmaster (Jeff Goldblum), who somehow found his way to Earth and turned out to be an even weirder roommate than Thor. The Grandmaster actually recruited Darryl as his new assistant/bodyguard to replace the late Topaz (Rachel House), who perished in Thor: Ragnarok.

This makes us wonder whether there’s another short film featuring Darryl or if he’s now become part of The Grandmaster’s entourage. Jeff Goldblum was spotted at a rugby match with Chris Hemsworth and Taika Waititi during production of Thor: Love & Thunder, making fans think that The Grandmaster would return in some capacity in the sequel. If that’s the case, maybe we’ll see Darryl making an appearance alongside the Sakaar ruler. Or maybe Goldblum was in town to shoot a new short with Darryl.

Personally, what I’d like to see is a short film showing what Darryl was dealing with after the events of Avengers: Infinity War and Avengers: Endgame. Getting Darryl’s perspective on what happened on Earth after The Snap offers plenty of comedic material, and it would make the perfect subject for a new mockumentary short. But we’ll be happy with whatever Taika Waititi might have up his sleeve.

The post Exclusive: Thor’s Roommate Darryl May Return to the MCU to Coincide With ‘Thor: Love & Thunder’ appeared first on /Film.

Sunday was August 1, which means that a third of the Atlantic hurricane season is now in the books. While that’s a good thing, the reality is that the vast majority of hurricane activity, historically, occurs after August 1st. And for the state of Texas, the odds of a hurricane strike after October 1st are remote. So for us, the next two months really matter. This is when you should have your hurricane plans finalized, and preparations made.

In terms of a near-term tropical forecast, Matt will have more in our weekly update on Tuesday. However, we’re definitely seeing signs that activity in the “main development region” between Africa and the Caribbean Sea will start to heat up in a week or so. And after that point we’ll likely be closely watching tropical activity for awhile.

Monday

Remarkably, the main discussion point for today, the second day of August, will be a cool front approaching the area. This “front” won’t bring too much cool or dry air, but it will generate enough of a disturbance in the atmosphere to provoke rising air and a good possibility of showers and thunderstorms. Most of the area should see partly sunny skies this morning, with increasing clouds late this morning to go along with rising rain chances.

I think we’ll see a round of showers that will hit about half of the region this afternoon, perhaps a break this evening, and then another round of storms overnight that will probably hit a majority of the Houston area. Accumulations for most will be on the order of 0.5 to 1.0 inch, but some few areas may pick up 3 or more inches. We’re not expecting anything more than low-lying street flooding, at worst. For the most part we should see highs in the low 90s.

Tuesday

As the front gets hung up along the coast on Tuesday, we should see scattered showers again although probably not with the intensity some areas see Monday and Monday night. Otherwise we expect partly sunny skies with highs in the low 90s. As far as cooling goes, overnight lows should drop into the mid-70s for much of the region, which isn’t terrible for August.

Wednesday and Thursday

The weather these days will depend on whether the front shoves all the way offshore, but if it does I expect a pair of reasonably pleasant August days, with highs in the low 90s, slightly lower humidity, and scattered to isolated rain chances. Lows will be in the 70s.

Friday, Saturday, and Sunday

The end of the week looks to bring mostly sunny weather to the region, with increasing humidity. Highs will likely be in the neighborhood of the mid-90s. At this point it looks like the atmosphere will be supportive of some scattered showers and thunderstorms during the afternoon hours with daytime heating. For the most part, however, this should be a pretty classic August weekend in Houston with heat and humidity.

The day that trainers all around the world have been dreading is finally here. Niantic has decided to follow through with their initial decision to revert pandemic incentives which originally included an increase to the distance needed to spin a PokéStop/Gym.

This change made it so trainers were able to gather items from stops while still maintaining a safe distance from others. It was a quality of life update that everyone benefitted from. Taking this bonus away negatively affects the gameplay quality drastically. With this latest change, The range has been decreased from 80 meters to 40 meters.

Trainers have been verbalizing their frustrations on social media proclaiming that the timing of this decision is not appropriate considering we are still in the midst of a pandemic. This is the reason why “Niantic” is currently trending on Twitter. There have been countless amounts of comments towards Niantic over social media and even petitions that have had thousands of signatures to plead that they reconsider this decision.

Those living in America and New Zealand have already been impacted by this change. The reduction of the in-game radius has already been reverted to ‘normal’ which has drastically altered people’s views of the game.

It may come as no surprise but players in these regions along with the rest of the player base are outraged at this revert, not only because it impacts the game but also for the safety of our fellow community. The Delta variant is causing many states in the USA to have overflowing hospitals and rising COVID rates.

Some places around the world such as the UK were granted an extra 30 days of the bonus which is pretty much just a countdown to the inevitable as some players see it.

Benefits of Interaction Distances

1. Not having to cross the street to engage with certain PokéStops and Gyms.
2. Being able to interact with PokéStops/Gyms from safer locations.
3. Being able to raid more discreetly from further away to avoid possible harassment from others.
4. Being able to continue walking at a regular pace rather than having to stop abruptly, slowing down or change the walking route in order to get items.
5. Being able to mitigate the issues of drift and not move around erratically to get in range of a PokéStop or Gym.

This decision has caused many players to not be able to play Pokémon GO safely, thus not playing at all. It not only hurts the player base but also Niantic from a business perspective since they rely on their players to earn passive income. Fewer players, the less income for Niantic, which is why this decision doesn’t make much sense to many people.

The Aftermath

Despite the negative backlash from players over social media, what does this mean for the future of Pokémon GO? Players living in these affected areas are going to have to learn to adapt to these changes. Along with the majority of the player base, sadly, people living with walking impediments or disabilities are going to be affected severely by this change as it means that some PokéStops that were accessible before, may not be possible to get anymore.

Speculation & Theories 

The Pokémon GO community believes that this change was unnecessary mainly because it doesn’t harm Niantic at all keeping in these benefits and that it only takes away the quality of life aspect.

The real reason behind this change has not been confirmed but players have speculated that it’s because of Niantic’s sponsors. Originally, sponsored stops were a way of bringing customers into a business, with the increased range duration, players were able to spin stops/gyms without going into/near a certain building or business, thus losing customers.

On the one hand, this could have been a factor in their decision, but on the other hand, it does not make much sense because, in New Zealand, sponsored stops were not available in the first place.

Community Poll

We put out a poll into our Pokémon GO Hub Discord asking if these changes to the special bonuses will make a difference in their gameplay experience. The results were conclusive that it indeed will cause a large number of players to play the game less compared to those who will continue to play the game as normal.

Parting Words

While these may be dark days in Pokémon GO, we as a community can stick together and continue to voice our opinions. We hope that with the help of this article and your combined efforts that something can be done about this change.

We would love to hear from you. Will you continue your Pokémon GO journey despite these changes?

Until next time, stay safe and always remember to prioritize your health and safety over anything.

–Adam ‘Avrip’

The post Niantic Removes Special Pandemic Bonuses appeared first on Pokémon GO Hub.

New Cyanide and Happiness Comic

It's been four months since water was added back to this mini aquatic ecosystem. Has that been enough time for life to reappear in this tiny jar?
Enjoy!

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Hedge Your Bets - TrackTribe

America's housing shortage has been decades in the making. A lot of people blame Baby Boomers — but is it really their fault? We unpack three big reasons for the shortage. | Subscribe to our weekly newsletter here.

Sometime in June of this year, a new Instagram account popped up with distinctive orange stripes, a quintessential Texas flair, and a collection of paintings.

Our familiarity with this palette of orange and white is not lost on anyone who lives in, or has driven through, Texas. Nor is it lost on midnight marauders trying to fix a night of too much revelry. The IG account belongs to the Whataburger Museum of Art, and it is for real.

Curious as hell, Glasstire DM’d the account for more information. It turns out to be official Whataburger Corporate Communications… although with more sleuthing, we determined that the account is created by Austin-based company McGarrah Jesse — and if so, may be the dopest PR campaign this side of the Pecos.

Glasstire: What is this glorious thing and whose idea was it?

Whataburger Corporate Communications: At Whataburger, we’re fortunate to have so many talented fans who have transformed their brand love into pieces of artwork — that’s pretty special, and they’ve inspired us. We wanted to support and celebrate the Whataburger fans whose artwork uplifts and connects us and created The Whataburger Museum of Art to help us do that.

GT: Where did you find the artists?

WCC: Like a true curated art collection, we looked for a variety of perspectives and interpretations of Whataburger fandom, and the artwork was sourced through Instagram and online galleries. We reached out to artists directly and asked them if they would like to be featured in The WMOA. We’re continuing to take submissions from artists through the Instagram account, @TheWMOA, and we’ll continue to feature new artists as the account grows.

GT: What has the response been?

WCC: As a brand, we’ve loved having the opportunity to shine a light on so many great artists – many of whom had tagged @Whataburger in the past. We encourage everyone who visits The WMOA to explore the artists’ accounts to support them and purchase their artwork. The WMOA online gallery launched in early June with a select group of featured artwork, and since then, the collection has continued to grow as new Whataburger fan art is submitted from across the globe.

****

To date, the WMOA’s Instagram account has 4,467 followers and 45 posts. Glasstire has visited the site over the past couple of weeks and have some favorites, including Raul Rene Gonzalez‘s Down the Street, which appears at the top of this page. (To learn more about Gonzales’ work, read our recent interview with the artist here).

For the curious artist, there is a link on the IG page where you may submit your best Whataburger art. Who knows: Maybe New York art critic Jerry Saltz can switch out his iconic 7-11 Super Big Gulp for a Whataburger Large, and support a Texas legacy company in the process.

“I was looking at a bag and thinking Whataburger is such a great Texas thing. And there are so many great people from Texas that go unrecognized, so what’s better than to paint Texans on it.” — Erik Seaholm

“My iconic signage work represents my home state and all those Sunday afternoons going to the drive thru at Whataburger and loving that feeling.” — Kristin Moore

“In high school, we’d always go to Whataburger after football games — it was always there. And everything I paint is something I’ve been inspired by and that I genuinely like, because that helps me enter a flow state when painting.” — Emily Sandoval

“Make art for yourself. I spent many years unhappy making art for a wider audience. I felt a disconnect. Once I started making pieces personal to me, opportunities opened up.” — Joan Leigh Horne

“My advice for any artist is to get out of your comfort zone. Don’t be scared to try new mediums. You’re only going to get better.” — Ann Fuhring

“As a kid, my mother took my brother and I downtown to Whataburger on the bay because she knew we liked to sit outside and, ironically, feed the sky rats. It was a great memory of spending time with my family and enjoying a Whataburger meal with my brother.” — Victoria Alma Villarreal

The post Y’all, There is a Whataburger Museum of Art appeared first on Glasstire.

Nominally this is a show of abstract paintings, but the three artists — Kate Petley, Lorraine Tady, and Liz Trosper — seem to be striving to make non-abstractions and non-paintings. A stretched canvas is, of course, a convention, like a stage set. A hundred years ago it was seen as a window; increasingly it’s a metaphor for a screen because that’s what most people look at all day. In the show the artists silently debate, through their painted proxies, how much to reveal of the guts and wiring of this perceptual frame.

For Lorraine Tady, the “screen” represents a snapshot of messy, convoluted, un-photographic processes. Tasty line quality, complex color, Cezanne-ian push and pull, and implied three-dimensional depth left over from the “window” era of painting still need to be present, even if there are no actual paint drips or signs of active layering or erasure on the surface. All that studio chaos remains essential, even if it’s ultimately flattened into a jet of ink uniformly sprayed onto a canvas.

Liz Trosper doesn’t emphasize the artist-skilled hand but believes hand manipulation still plays a role in art. Hers “perform,” like a puppeteer’s, moving ropes of brightly colored extruded acrylic around on a flatbed scanner. The movements, slow or jerky, confuse the scanner, creating accidental patterns and moires similar to analog TV static. This allows the machine itself to “perform,” with random gesture-like strokes that confuse and flatten the images of meandering tubes of color. As with Tady’s work, this activity reaches a final stage — a photographic rendering printed on canvas — without any further mark-making.

For Kate Petley, some hint of physical paint must be present on the surface in order to pull the viewer’s eye into the frame, even if only, initially, to satisfy curiosity about what is actually brushed or sprayed or taped. Once lured, the attention remains fixed on the imagery and other puzzles emerge. For example: What are the shapes in her paintings, exactly? They appear to be elegantly folded corrugated cardboard, casting dark, photographic shadows. It’s not photography in the flat, scanner sense but is shot in a “tabletop studio” style, with tripod, camera, and lighting documenting temporarily set-up materials. Glimpses of the crumpled models are lost in seductive fields of pure color, which might be paint on the canvas, paint on the photographed object, or the reflection of colored gel lights hitting planar surfaces.

But printing processes and imaging technology have improved so much nowadays that the eye has great difficulty discerning what’s painted and what’s printed, which may be why the presence of paint is less of an issue for the other two artists. Petley’s photographs are digitized and printed on canvas but she stresses in her artist’s statement that the photos are “created in-camera, not in the computer” and that it’s “urgent” for her hand-painting to be present in the finished print (albeit subtly blended with the photography). Clearly she draws her personal ethical line at the completely printed painting and use of software interventions in the digital conversion from photo to canvas.

But is old-school photography, with its rich textures and shadows and indexical relationship to the Real, automatically superior to sculptural maquettes imaged in the harsh light of a scanner bed? Is the play of incandescent light and shadows inherently more honest than virtual lighting and filter effects in Photoshop, which can be used to achieve similar ends?

Ultimately it’s a conversation and not a jury trial. All three artists are asking the kinds of questions everyone should be asking about our brave new Screen World. How much of the “media landscape” is manipulated? What are acceptable levels of manipulation? What is the role of aesthetics in modern life? Can visual seduction be good or must it always be challenged? Is photography truth? Can deep fakes be detected? Is the artist a shamanic figure attracting followers with overt physical talent, or a behind-the-scenes game player whose work must be decoded? It’s a lot to ask of one exhibition, but all that interrogation is there if you give it a hard look.

Through July 31 at Barry Whistler Gallery, Dallas.

Tom Moody is an artist who has been blogging since 2001. His website is https://tommoody.us

The post On Screen/Off Screen: Kate Petley, Lorraine Tady, & Liz Trosper at Barry Whistler appeared first on Glasstire.

Teen Guide to Staying Sober
Chiu
1998

The Drug Abuse Prevention Series is one that has popped up regularly. My gripe was mostly the poor (read: cheap) pictures that illustrated the books. Sometimes they were just odd, others seemed to have nothing to do with the topic. I think they looked dated even when they were fresh from the publisher. Take a look at some of these companion titles from this series:

• • • Drugs and Domestic Violence
    • Drugs and Anger
    • Marijuana
    • Drugs and Your Parents
    • Fetal Alcohol Syndrome

Time to retire the series or at least get some newer material.

Mary

The post Sober Teens appeared first on Awful Library Books.

Gameplay and overview of the ELEVENTH expansion pack to The Sims 4. This time it's an English countryside farming thing of sorts. Livestock to raise, eggs to hatch, critters to befriend, and I spose there's a cottage or two to live in. Let's just see if it's worth that $40 price tag.

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