A bit of history:

Nine years before the Montgomery Bus Boycott, Viola Desmond refused to give up her seat in the whites-only section of a movie theatre, and was arrested for refusing to comply with segregationist laws.

In 2010, she posthumously received a free pardon for the act. (In Canada, a "free pardon" is different from a regular pardon in that it is an official acknowledgment that no wrongdoing took place.)

This week, Viola Desmond replaced Sir John A. Macdonald on the $10 bill. (For you folks in the USA, this is like replacing George Washington with Rosa Parks. Analogies don't get much more exact than this.)

Here's a photo of the new bill, held by Viola Desmond's sister:




Now for the question:

Is this the first time a regular circulation bill has been designed in portrait orientation instead of landscape orientation? (It's definitely a first in Canada.)

George H.W. Bush: June 12, 1924 - November 30, 2018

A man who:

• Knew enough to be polite to political leaders that he strongly disagreed with (e.g. Saddam Hussein);
  
• Knew that free trade was a generator of wealth (bringing Mexico into NAFTA);
  
• Knew that maintaining friendships with allied nations even during trade disputes with those nations was important;
  
• Was able to work with the Democrats even when he didn't want to;
  
• Knew climate change was real and supported legislation to reduce acid rain; and
  
• Was secure enough to poke fun at himself on SNL.
  

Quirks & Quarks: A new plane with no moving parts flies by electrifying the air

MIT's Electric Aircraft  Initiative have managed to get electroaerodynamic propulsion working in the lab - 60 meters over 10 flights, with an average altitude of 0.47 meters, with no propellers or jet engines or other moving parts. There's a video of how it works on the web page, just above the link to the paper published in Nature.

EDIT: Oh, it's a YouTube vid. Here you go:




It's barely at the Kitty Hawk stage right now, if that, but it flies.


And, no doubt, the same principle is used by all those flying electromasters in superhero fiction...  

Just so no one who's joined us since last December panics, on Saturday I turn the snow back on again.

https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archiv...ge/576802/

Interesting article trying to diagnose why we can't seem to act on the big challenges facing the nation.

• Anti-statism combined with the assumption that the free market will take care of it.
  
• Anti-intellectualism
  
• The conceit that this Nation special and above what ails everyone else
  
• A system of government that disproportionately favors rural states
  

"Power is a terrible thing, teishi.  It can turn the weak into
bullies and an innocent into a tyrant if it is not understood and
used sparingly.  There is a responsibility that must be 
acknowledged by those who gain power on the scale you and I 
possess -- a responsibility to know when and when *not* to use our
power -- and *how*.  Always be wary of using *too much*, because 
there is always a way to solve any problem that is simple and 
easy and massive overkill, and which will have so many unexpected
side effects that they will swamp out any good you intended to 
do.  In anything but the defeat of your enemies, always use the
lightest touch and the least power necessary, because there is a
great difference between a drinking fountain and a fire hose.

"And yes, I know I am a hypocrite where this is concerned.  But
for many uses of my own power, I have no chance to be subtle or
learn subtlety."

I've been pruning my selection of which web comics I read on a regular basis, taking titles off my "check periodically" lists for various reasons (not updating often enough for me to remember the story, humour comics that I just don't find humourous any more, the strip's creator has decided to focus on other projects, the writer's using the strip for Author Tracts instead of putting the messages into the story, etc.)

Which of course means I have time to read other comics.

What's good nowadays? Please give me one or two suggestions, keeping in mind the reasons why I dropped strips in the first place.

As to what I'm still reading: On the web-first side, xkcd, Sluggy Freelance, GPF, PvP (although that's getting close to "not funny any more"), Girl Genius, Kevin & Kell, Bug Martini, Grrl Power, Freefall, Darths & Droids, Friendship is Dragons, Wrong Hands, Order of the Stick, Sequential Art, and (of course) Erma. (I would have included Kiwi Blitz, but it's on hiatus.) In the legacy media, Dilbert (getting very close to "not funny any more") and Heart of the City (which I'm liking the recent revamp of).

And the long-timers here know what I like in other media.

Oh, yes: I really can't stand Penny Arcade, and I find SMBC to be hit-or-miss.

I know we don't normally talk sports here, but...

Grey Cup - the final game of the year.

One second before halftime.

Ottawa forced to punt. Calgary makes a 97-yard return and scores a touchdown.

Longest punt return touchdown in Grey Cup history, and the Grey Cup is more than twice the age of the Superbowl.

Halftime now...

I was working on background for that Arc 2 story where Moonbase Alpha appears, and suddenly this insisted on being written. As far as I'm concerned, it's canon for the Metacontinuity... but not before Arc 2, because that's the earliest that Starfleet databanks are available. -Rob

I just spent enough in the Sentai Filmworks Black Friday sale to get a free month of their HIDIVE service. Does anybody know anything about it? (What shows do they have, is the service any good, is a code issued in the USA usable in Canada, that sort of thing...)