Evening Tea: Lukewarm Surprise, Nonviolent Crimes, and Balkonkraftwerk

The clucking on Twitter for hours about Trump & the GOP trying to get ahead of an October Surprise might not be the political H-bomb that Politico & Atlantic writers think. To the point where it might not have been worth holding back publishing until I was able to get details from an adult source. Given what had come out this week to essentially zero coverage, I won’t hold my breath that this moves any needles. Get to the end for one of my favorite Talking Heads remixes.

Donald Trump groped me in what felt like a ‘twisted game’ with Jeffrey Epstein, former model alleges (Guardian) As terrible as this is, and as much as it’s going to push the “Epstein & Trump: Besties” narrative, I am utterly unimpressed. Didn’t they say he was DOA after the “Grab Them” interview? Does anyone really think one more person coming forward to admit Trump sexually assaulted them is going to be the rocks on which the Orange Wave finally crashes?

Murder Is Likely Falling At The Fastest Pace Ever Recorded In 2024 (Jeff Asher) We have largely eliminated violent crime from our society, in so many parts of the country. The memes notwithstanding, look at any crime charts that include the 90s. Then come back and tell me that your local Murdoch rag is right.

Wealth distribution in the United States, 2024 (Righto) A wild way to visualize wealth in this country. Everyone you’ve ever known and will ever know is 1 pixel in on the graph.

Physicists create one-dimensional gas out of light, achieving bizarre quantum state (Tech Spot) An exotic state of matter sounds like a really expensive strip club near Los Alamos. Another term mentioned in the article, “degenerate quantum gases” is what people called Dubstep when it first showed up in 2010.

Vaporizing plastics recycles them into nothing but gas (Ars Technica) Degenerate Plastic Gases is the name of my new Bagpipe Noisecore band. But hopefully, this will actually give us a way to void the millions of tons of plastic we’ve pumped out as a species.

A smartphone that can charge itself from sunlight — scientists have created transparent solar cells that can be embedded in glass (TechRadar) No need to check if this is a FB meme, we’re actually there. It’s a bunch of years out from being useful at the commercial level, but it works.

How Germany outfitted half a million balconies with solar panels (Grist) Balkonkraftwerk is the German word for balcony solar. Germans started installing solar panels on their balcony, for like 600 bucks, using kits they got at the grocery store. I wonder what would happen to the NYC, Houston, or Dallas power grid if every balcony in high rise apartments had photovoltaics humming.

Psychedelic Mushrooms Are Getting Much, Much Stronger (Wired) Given how many people have difficulties with even the smallest psychedelic experience, this is probably not great. Our steroidification of cannabis didn’t do anyone any favors, and this is more of that. So, let’s not and say we did?

Quote of the Week

Oh, the terrible struggle that I have had against sleep so often as of late; the pain of sleeplessness, or the pain of the fear of sleep, and with such unknown horror as it has for me! How blessed are some people, whose lives have no fears, no dreads; to whom sleep is a blessing that comes nightly, and brings nothing but sweet dreams.~Bram Stoker, Dracula

Poem of the Week

Vibe of the Week

An upbeat eternal favorite friends of the Tea might recognize. Let it take us away, gliding into the next thing.

How did we get here?!tn