Books I Read in March 2023

1 Apr 202311 May 2023 JavaElemental ☕

The Marlow Murder Club was a delightful little read – the main character is a 77 year old lady who lives on whiskey, crosswords, skinny-dipping, and hoarding, and she sets out to solve the murder of her neighbor with the help of a couple of other local misfits. There’s a second book due out at the end of May, Death Comes to Marlow, and I’m really looking forward to it.

Bitter Medicine, meanwhile, could have been good. I thought it was going to be an urban fantasy with a neat, non-European based magic system and some cool characters in a nifty little world, but instead it turned out to be a paranormal romance with some tacked-on, half-baked worldbuilding that never really got finished and nowhere near enough detail about how the magic worked. It was pretty disappointing.

The Marlow Murder Club, Robert Thorogood
Bitter Medicine, Mia Tsai

Letters from Watson: The Five Orange Pips, A Case of Identity, The Red-Headed League, The Adventure of the Dying Detective, The Adventure of the Blue Carbuncle, Arthur Conan Doyle

Little Notes & Short Posts

Donald Trump just got indicted.

30 Mar 202330 Mar 2023 JavaElemental ☕

Hey, the grand jury hearing the Stormy Daniels hush money case just made history and indicted a former US president.

🍊 CNN: Donald Trump indicted by Manhattan grand jury

Screenshot of text from linked article. Text reads, 'Donald Trump has been indicted by a Manhattan grand jury, according to multiple sources familiar with the matter – the first time in American history that a current or former president has faced criminal charges. The indictment has been filed under seal and will be announced in the coming days. The charges are not publicly known at this time, one source told CNN. Trump will likely be arraigned in court early next week, according to his defense attorney, Joe Tacopina. The DA’s office has been investigating the former president in connection with his alleged role in a hush money payment scheme and cover-up involving adult film star Stormy Daniels that dates to the 2016 presidential election. Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg’s office will reach out to Trump’s attorneys to discuss his surrender to face an arraignment.'

Cool. Now put his criminal ass in jail.

ETA: There’s still time to sign up at indictment.fyi. You’ll get a regular email with all the news and updates pertaining to Trump’s indictment or indictments from Dan Sinker, the guy who ran impeachment.fyi both times Trump got impeached.

NPR: Live updates: Donald Trump has been indicted for hush money payments
New York Times: Here are the key events that led to the indictment.

TV & Movies

A couple movies you should watch…

24 Mar 2023 JavaElemental ☕

Hey, so, if you never saw The Nice Guys, you should definitely put that on your to-do list.

It came out in 2016, right when everything was going to hell in a handbasket, and it’s not a Marvel movie, so I think it might have slipped under the radar a bit. It stars Russel Crowe and Ryan Gosling, and it was made by Shane Black, which are pretty good indications that it’s a great movie. It hilarious, smart, and a lot of fun. Go watch it.

Also, there are rumors that a sequel might finally be in development, and that would be awesome.

Here’s another movie you should watch that got basically no marketing and slid in under everyone’s radar during the pandemic: Confess, Fletch.

This one stars Jon Hamm as Fletch and is not a sequel to the Chevy Chase movies – it’s more of a reboot, but even that not really. It’s more like “What if we took another crack at these movies, but we actually paid attention to the books and got a funny actor who took the job seriously and didn’t make everyone miserable to be around?”

Confess, Fletch was hilarious and Jon Hamm as Fletch is funny, charming, and tons of fun to watch. If you missed this one, go fix that.

Little Notes & Short Posts

Trump claims he’s getting arrested tomorrow.

20 Mar 202320 Mar 2023 JavaElemental ☕

Trump posted to his TruthSocial network over the weekend claiming he was getting arrested for the Stormy Daniels thing on Tuesday, and calling for protests.

He said, “Now illegal leaks from a corrupt and highly political Manhattan district attorneys office, which has allowed new records to be set in violent crime and whose leader is funded by George Soros, indicate that, with no crime being able to be proven, and based on an old and fully debunked (by numerous other prosecutors!) fairytale, the far and away leading Republican candidate and former president of the United States of America, will be arrested on Tuesday of next week. Protest, take our nation back!”

(Back when I was in school we got yelled at for writing run-on sentences like that. 😒)

Is he actually getting arrested tomorrow? Pfft, who knows. Probably soon, though. Some people are mad because he might be getting arrested over this first, as opposed to a “more serious” crime like staging an insurrection or election fraud. Please remember that the Stormy Daniels case isn’t about him banging a porn star, it’s a campaign finance fraud case. The dude misappropriated election funds to pay off Daniels.

“Oh, this isn’t serious, it involves an icky, slutty girl.” Man, grow up. He stole campaign money to bribe someone to keep their mouth shut about a scandal. It’s serious.

Whether it’s provable and results in an arrest is another matter, but it looks like they’re going to give it a try sometime this week, so I guess keep an eye out for that.

Reminder: If you want a fun way to keep on Trump indictment news, sign up at indictment.fyi, a little website/newsletter spun together by Dan Sinker, the fellow who, among other things, ran impeachment.fyi back when Trump was getting impeached (both times).

Little Notes & Short Posts

Say Yes! to Michigan

14 Mar 2023 JavaElemental ☕

The Michigan Senate voted today to end their “right to work” law that let workers enjoy the benefits of union membership without paying union dues. It just needs Gov. Whitmer’s signature to make it official.

👉 Detroit News: Michigan Senate approves repeal of right-to-work law – “The Michigan Senate was approving landmark victories for organized labor Tuesday evening by repealing the 2012 right-to-work law that made union membership optional at unionized workplaces and re-establishing a prevailing wage standard for state projects.”

The point of this law was only ever to weaken unions by taking a chunk out of their funding, which comes from union dues. Why would you pay union dues if you’re getting the benefits anyway? Don’t want to join a union? Don’t go to work for a union shop. Oh, they pay better? And you get better benefits and more sick and vacation days and whatnot? Then shut up, pay your dues, and work there. Pretty straightforward.

You can add this to the list of things Michigan is doing right lately, like protecting abortion rights and protecting LGBTQ+ rights.