JD (not that one) Paul (not that one)
LightNews LightNews
banner
rantingnerd.bsky.social
JD (not that one) Paul (not that one)
@rantingnerd.bsky.social
240 followers 110 following 340 posts
He/him
Former physicist, current Google SRE (opinions my own)
https://www.alphabetworkersunion.org member, https://www.haverford.edu grad

Also https://hachyderm.io/@rantingnerd
Blog: https://rantingnerd.blogspot.com

I am not my cousin's keeper.
Posts Replies Media Videos
rantingnerd.bsky.social
My favorite version of this is from Emma Bull's _Territory_, wherein one of the main characters is learning the ropes as a reporter in Tombstone, Arizona:
2 paragraphs from Emma Bull's _Territory_, when one of the main characters is learning to be a reporter in one of Tombstone, Arizona's newspapers: She read them as he waited. He'd re-moved words as a gardener might prune the topiary. He'd cut phrases that separated facts from their meaning. He'd made work-manlike sentences graceful, and made halting paragraphs flow. She'd thought he was making her work his own. Instead he'd made it into what she'd meant it to be. She handed the pages back. No, not pages - *copy*. "I see." What she wanted to say was, "I have been given a revelation," but she didn't think Richard Rule would be comfortable in the role of a literary burn-ing bush.
November 18, 2025 at 2:01 PM
rantingnerd.bsky.social
💯 (county-level stuff, too)

@marklevinenyc.bsky.social posted this (on Xitter, not here, come on, Mark) that pushes it the other way:
A post from Xitter by @MarkLevineNYC, caption "Every person in American Politics should be forced to look at this map" An image of the united states broken down into 2 colors, red and light blue, each of which contributes 50% to GDP. The light blue are small-area, large-population metro areas like SF, LA, Boston, NYC-Philadelpha-Washington, Chicago, Raleigh-Durham, Seattle, etc.
October 27, 2025 at 12:49 PM
rantingnerd.bsky.social
The one that absolutely slew me (on a re-read) is from _Paladin's Faith":
Having grown up in Anuket City, Marguerite was familiar with many clockwork creations, not to mention all the ways that they could go horribly wrong. (Ninety-nine times out of a hundred, it was an explosion. The hundredth time, it ran amok and stabbed innocent by-standers, and the artificer would be left standing there saying, "But I had to put blades on it, or how would it rake the leaves?" while the gutters filled up with blood.)
September 28, 2025 at 12:54 AM
rantingnerd.bsky.social
NO KINGS
NO SLAVERS
NO NAZIS
NO EXCEPTIONS
3 American Flags: (1) the Betsy Ross Flag, next to NO KINGS (2) the Fort Sumter Flag, next to NO SLAVERS (3) the 48-star US flag used during WWII, next to NO NAZIS NO EXCEPTIONS
June 14, 2025 at 3:46 PM
rantingnerd.bsky.social
This was the one where I nope'd out of Spelling Bee, from June 2022:
January 26, 2025 at 6:04 PM
rantingnerd.bsky.social
This is too good not to repost. @effinbirds.com and @murderbotbot.bsky.social , two great tastes that go great together.
Two juxtaposed Bluesky posts. Top: @effinbirds.com, with a lovely woodcut of a bird on a branch, text: "forgive me for wondering why the fuck you're still here". Bottom: @murderbotbot.bsky.social saying "Sometimes I wonder what the point of it all is."
January 18, 2025 at 7:37 PM
rantingnerd.bsky.social
May you have better instructions than these (which I can only read as "don't drop this on your junk"):
An IKEA "warnings" cartoon from an IKEA assembly manual. 4 panels, 2 of them "normal": "I am puzzled by this", "so I will call IKEA for help". The other two are "I am kneeling next to this unit smiling, touching it with one hand" and the final is "I am kneeling next to this unit frowning, my arms behind my back, a crack in the corner of the unit, and a big X mark over it". That final panel looks like the person dropped the unit on part of their anatomy, possibly their genitalia.
January 18, 2025 at 12:36 AM
rantingnerd.bsky.social
Our orange tortie cat, Pippin, either hides in cardboard (a remarkably good camouflage for her shade of orange), or sits on blue or purple to really stand out. So yes.

(Example of color coordination for cat tax.)
Pippin, an orange tortie cat, sits on top of a UPS (uninterruptible power supply) housed in a narrow side table, in the corner of a room painted a rich orange.)
January 17, 2025 at 1:47 AM
rantingnerd.bsky.social
You will be visited by three spirits
Clancy Brown as "Rawhide", Jeff Goldblum as "New Jersey", and Peter Weller as Buckaroo Banzai, from the 1984 film "The Adventures of Buckaroo Banzai Across the 8th Dimension".
December 24, 2024 at 4:24 PM
rantingnerd.bsky.social
I am not my cousin's keeper.

(A dear friend made this for me. 😊)
Simpsons "don't make me tap the sign" meme: 2 panels one over the other. Top panel: bus driver saying "Don't make me tap sign". Bottom panel: bus driver's hand pointing to a sign that has been edited to say "I am not my cousin's keeper".
December 23, 2024 at 4:16 PM
rantingnerd.bsky.social
Obligatory foone repost (not going to link to Xitter though):
foone @Foone friendly reminder since this is going around again: DO NOT EAT THE RICH! it's called bio-magnification, people! the rich are at the top of the food chain, so they accumulate toxins from their food at a greatly increased rate. Instead, /compost/ the rich. 4:05 PM · Jun 29, 2018
December 22, 2024 at 2:13 PM
rantingnerd.bsky.social
I have been obsessively rereading @tkingfisher.com books over the past few weeks, to keep myself from twitching. This quote is such an amazing distillation of why I love the World of the White Rat so much.
A quote from Paladin's Hope, by T. Kingfisher: The older woman looked up at him with too-bright eyes. " The gods take care of you, son." The corner of Piper's lip twisted up. "I hope so," he said, "but until then, we've got to take care of each other."
November 3, 2024 at 6:20 PM
rantingnerd.bsky.social
For national cat day, Abby says "hi". Also "you don't get to use your backpack."
Abby, a Himalayan cat (light brown fur with dark points, like a Siamese cat, and bright blue eyes) lies on top of my black LL Bean backpack, which in turn lies on top of a blue comforter on a bed.
October 30, 2024 at 2:06 AM
rantingnerd.bsky.social
Sometimes the timeline provides:
A phone screenshot of @jamellebouie.net's posts - New York magazine severing ties with Olivia Nuzzi - and then his immediate follow-up, saying '"uniquely talented", though? boy, I dunno' -- followed in the timeline by an @effinbirds.com post: an attractive woodcut bird, with the caption "THAT'S A BIG FUCKING NOPE"
October 21, 2024 at 11:19 PM
rantingnerd.bsky.social
Show me your pet and what they're named after.
Titus, a large tiger tabby, comfortably sprawled on a blanket draped over the back of a couch. Titus Pullo, a main character from HBO/BBC's *Rome* series, played by the late Ray Stevenson. He is in Roman Centurion uniform, on a horse, with bits of leather armor and a red cape, but no helmet.
October 19, 2024 at 5:22 PM
rantingnerd.bsky.social
Today's Far Side replay (from 1990) is amazingly apropos for today's political climate. www.thefarside.com/2024/10/15/3

"In the corner, Vance was putting the move on two females—unaware that his fake hood had begun to slip."
A far side cartoon of a stereotypical party in a room full of hooded snakes (Cobras?). One of them has a fake hood (what looks like a pot lid with a handle around the snake's body); he is talking to two snakes with cartoon-ish female signifiers (long eyelashes, "librarian" horn-rimmed glasses). Caption: In the corner, Vance was putting the move on two females—unaware that his fake hood had begun to slip.
October 15, 2024 at 1:20 PM
rantingnerd.bsky.social
Situation at our house:
An orange tortie cat looks up from within a Saks Off 5th shopping bag, from where she lies comfortably on a black sweater.
October 12, 2024 at 9:45 PM
rantingnerd.bsky.social
I am Bluesky user #1,090,996. So close to 1M!
My "Celebrating 10M users" certificate. I am user number 1,090,996, joined Sep 19, 2023.
September 17, 2024 at 12:30 AM
rantingnerd.bsky.social
A strip mall store front with a huge high-contrast sign saying NEWYOUSPAWNY.COM, along with 2 similarly-sized but low-contrast signs saying "new you" and "REFLEXOLOGY". in the window are small, hard to read posters that say "newYou spa" with a list of spa services + "NOW OPEN", and a poster with photos of hands performing bodywork.
September 8, 2024 at 3:26 PM
rantingnerd.bsky.social
Perfect timeline juxtaposition:
August 14, 2024 at 1:00 AM
rantingnerd.bsky.social
If you see this, post a picture you took of a sunset
View of a street facing west, with the sun going down, lighting up clouds from below. A pair of red traffic lights looks like demonic eyes.
June 17, 2024 at 4:51 PM
rantingnerd.bsky.social
Coraline reference on SNL!
(2nd day running of me tagging @neilhimself.neilgaiman.com . Not planned, honest.)

youtu.be/Ttska8oXZP4?...
SNL cast member Michael Longfellow, playing a teacher in a sketch. "I wore a yellow raincoat on a rainy day, and the sixth graders called me Coraline."
May 12, 2024 at 6:15 PM
rantingnerd.bsky.social
This is my favorite line from #DeadBoyDetectives (which is a story from @neilhimself.neilgaiman.com 's Sandman universe). It's almost like Murderbot as a ghost.

I really enjoyed this show.
A picture of a stereotypical Pacific Northwest Lighthouse Keeper (tall white guy wearing a sweater and cap), who is a ghost, with SUPER intense eyes, saying "If I wanted to be around people, I'd haunt a Denny's."
May 11, 2024 at 7:45 PM
rantingnerd.bsky.social
Our Pippin once pressed Control-A (select all) and then "az", deleting an entire document I was presenting to a meeting....
Pippin, an orange tortie cat, sits on a keyboard tray next to a keyboard.
January 26, 2024 at 11:40 PM