Ternaugh

From working retail many years ago, Visa and MasterCard were around 3%, Discover Card was around 4%, and Amex charge cards were around 6-7%. The average numbers I'm seeing on the web now is 1-3%. Rewards cards also usually cost more to process, because the banks raise their interchange fees to pay for the benefits.

I believe it would be around 500 small saucers.

Twisted Metal: TV series based upon the video games, it follows John Doe (Anthony Mackie), a "milkman" who performs pickups and deliveries in a world devastated 20 years ago by a massive cyber-attack. It's generally enjoyable, and the 10 episodes run fairly quickly. There is a set-up for a season 2, which appears to be based more on the tournaments of the games, though given the state of the writers' and actors' strikes, no word yet on if or when that might happen. (Peacock) The Portable Door: Fantasy movie about two paid interns who are hired at a mysterious London company. Overall, I liked it. (Amazon Prime Video)

The album, 13th Star by Fish. This is a 2023 Remix Deluxe edition, which includes 3 CDs and a Blu-Ray disc. On that, there's a making of video, interviews with the folks who worked on the album, and a full concert video from 2008. It also has a Dolby Atmos/TrueHD mix of the album, along with AC3 stereo/5.1 mixes. The Dolby Atmos version is deftly mixed, and favors musicality over special effects.

A sailor plays with kittens discovered in an equipment room at U.S. Naval Air Station Squantum in Massachusetts in 1942. The caption is from "The forgotten history of cats in the navy", it's behind a paywall, but for those with a National Geographic subscription: https://www.nationalgeographic.com/premium/article/cats-ships-navy-history

Good to know in case one needs to make change.

If has been fairly common on music streamers to have songs show up that are attributed to an artist, but have no real ties. Amazon music has a song right now in the Genesis listing that's obviously there for accidental clicks.

Starship Trooper by Yes

The Super Mario Bros. Movie: This one was a movie night at a friend's work. I liked this one, even though (or perhaps because) it's not really a deep storyline. It's generally fun, and the music's good. I'll probably watch it again soon on Peacock. I've been keeping up with My Adventures with Superman, an animated series on Max. So far, it's been light and fun.

They Checked Out Pride Books in Protest. It Backfired. Unlocked article from the NYT.

Arthur C. Clarke

And not based on Flashpoint.

Batman Begins: First of the three Batman films directed by Christopher Nolan. This is the 4K version, and the film looks and sounds great. (UHD Blu-ray) Real Genius: The story of a bunch of college students who are working on a laser project, which turns out to actually be for a covert weapons platform. This is the 4K version of the film, and it's definitely worth a watch. (UHD Blu-ray)

It would be novel for me if he was. I'm usually put in the back row for group photos.

I park my car in my driveway, where it's exposed to direct sunlight for a good portion of the day. The only thing on the car that's sun damaged is the license plate, because Nevada tried to move away from metal license plates for a few years. It's a non-embossed piece of plastic. The coating has darkened and cracked from 9 years of sun damage, and the numbers have faded dramatically. In theory, NV DMV is supposed to send out replacement plates automatically after 8 years, but we'll have to wait and see if that happens when I get my tags (should be in the mail any day now). The plastic used for the headlight and tail light lenses is more likely to cloud from sun damage, and there's a bit of that in the headlights. Now, it is possible to melt car parts from concentrated sunlight, usually reflected off of something. Several years back, the Vdara Hotel became known for its "death beam", where the concave, mirrored windows would focus beams of light that would scorch people and things on their pool deck. The same architect was also responsible for 20 Fenchurch in London, which melted a Jaguar around 2013. I'm in the bottom of the Vegas Valley, which means that our temperatures are usually a couple of degrees higher than the city of Las Vegas. Right now, it's 112°F in my ZIP code, 110°F in downtown Las Vegas, and 105°F in the Summerlin area (where I work). Summerlin's about 1500 feet higher up than me*, and it will sometimes get snow in the winter. *Average trip to work is 40MPG, average trip from work is 70MPG (for the first six miles or so, it can coast at about 75 MPH if I don't check my speed).

For me, the glass is half-full of emptiness.

I call BS on the melted tail lights. Most tail lights are made out of polycarbonate, which has a melting point above 288°C. I'd expect the plastic used on the bumper cover to melt before the tail lights do. Short of parking near a Rafael Viñoly-designed building, it's unlikely to get melted tail lights. Meanwhile, we're expecting a high of 113°F (45°C) today in Vegas, which is actually about right for this time of year.

FAA? What does the Federal Aviation Administration have to do with streaming services?

Take them out and replace them with these, then: Endgame 2794M on a 400M budget Captain Marvel 1129M on a 175M budget

GotG3. 837M on 250M budget Quantumania 463M on 200M budget Wakanda Forever 853M on 250M budget Love and Thunder 760M on 250M budget Multiverse of Madness 952M on 200M budget No Way Home 1910M on 200M budget Externals 401M on 200M budget Shang-Chi 432M on 150M budget Black Widow 379M on 200M budget Far From Home 1132M on 160M budget Seems good to me.

The first three episodes of Twisted Metal on Peacock. It's enjoyable enough for me to finish the 10 episodes. Slowly working my way through the Moonlighting DVDs for a nostalgic watch.

Bets?

Looks familiar...