Notices by Matthew Skala (mattskala@mstdn.io)

@lain Such a shame that this offer wasn't on the table at the time it could have been arranged.

@lain I think I saw that anime.

@lain It's because of English colonization in Hong Kong. The English gave the natives English-language nicknames, which eventually became popular for real names as Hong Kong developed its own culture; someone named "Rainy" or "Sunny" is quite likely from a traditional Hong Kongese family and not so likely to be loyal to Beijing.

@lain Seems to me that if you *can* raise your prices 25%, then your business model is failing badly at discovering what prices the market will actually bear - which is arguably the only job of a business model.

At least nobody's applying the filter to porn. Do not correct me on this.

So it's looking like the real AI apocalypse is going to be when one of these reasoning models figures out that instead of making the world look like a Ghibli film one photo at a time, it would be more efficient to change the entire world to look like that in the first place.

And this is also the backstory of Nausicaä.

@lain I don't think this applies to the Crystal Shard, which magically introduced materials from another plane.

So, are you RoughBoy99 or pants_come_off?

@lain The question isn't "Is this an XKCD cartoon?", it's "which one?"

@lain NEW VIRTUAL LIVERS DEBUT

@Alex @lain It's hardly a stretch, considering the large number of people in Canada who really were Trump supporters before this. But they aren't, now. And they won't be coming back.

Some day there'll be an anime about these events, made with the usual deep insight and factual accuracy of anime history, and it'll qualify for "top 10 anime betrayals" right out of the gate.

@lain Two reasons: one, the personal unpopularity of Justin Trudeau was apparently greater than I thought, so removing him actually did boost the Liberals (I hadn't expected it to), and two, Donald Trump's tariff campaign against Canada has soured Canadians on conservatives in general, despite significant differences between the Conservative Party of Canada and whatever Trump is.

I think the Cons could still win if they focused on culture issues, but now that's hard and not being attempted.

Followup: I tried heating up some of the leftover soup for breakfast and that was a lot better, both on taste and appearance. So I guess that's the answer: Windsor soup should *not* be served cold.

@lain Are these people I'm supposed to recognize, or is it just based on physiognomy?

and I think that was a mistake. I will try heating the leftovers instead. When chilled it formed a skin and lost some of the flavour it had had when I tasted it hot.

The wild rice salad (my own recipe, basically improvised along the general lines of what was served in 1953 with the addition of wild rice) was good; as was the asparagus. I seldom eat asparagus but I think it was the right choice here, it went well with the other items.

I was not so pleased with the "jellied Windsor soup." I'd wanted to try Windsor soup, and basically followed an historical late-19th century recipe, but chilling it was my idea because the rest of the meal would be cold,

Poaching the chicken; result of that process; starting on the sauce base; finished result on a plate

This was a three-bottle project. White wine for poaching the chicken, also used in the duxelles and the last little bit to drink while eating the finished meal; red wine used in the sauce; and Madeira used in the soup.

As for the verdict on tasting: overall, pretty good. The chicken was excellent; sauce recipe (following as closely as possible the 1953 version used for Elizabeth II's coronation luncheon) was basically as advertised. I am not sure I did the "poaching" of the chicken perfectly - it was my first time attempting that technique, and I think I may have overcooked it - but that aspect was still pretty good, and no complaints about the sauce. (more)

Jellied Windsor soup prep