I feel like some kind of veil has been lifted between the reality I inhabit and some alternate universe. The list is split between places I rarely/never set foot in and twice as many places I’ve never heard of.

It sounds like it has enough brand recognition that folks know it exists and what it is and imagine it a fancy place to eat but haven’t actually gone there themselves, or perhaps have on an incredibly rare special occasion.

I know next to nothing about Olive Garden and its menu so learning they serve ranch dressing with everything makes sense but is also making my eye twitch. 

Dying quietly because it would inconvenience other people for you to speak up is an unfair expectation, to put it mildly.

I know those are the ultimate choices. It’s why I started my comment with a rock/hard place analogy.

Israel also has a known and admitted history of performing forced contraception, based on ethnicity. Their record on reproduction issues is not as sterling as you may think it is.

Maybe Biden should have done a better job earning their vote then.

I fail to see how this means you shouldn’t protest the guy actively helping Israel to bomb Gaza. They are hardly going to be able to protest him in the White House. They have to protest when he is out and about. And the fact is he will always be out an about talking about another important problem. His job is to…

And a vote for Biden is a vote for someone who has enabled genocide. It is a rock and a hard place. I will probably vote for him but it will be with incredible shame and frustration. Voting for him will not bring me joy. It will simultaneously feel like a sacrifice and a selfish act. And that is a terrible feeling to…

No one believes Republicans will care or be better in any way, shape, or form, on the issue.

The vice squeezing Palestinian Americans and their allies — Arab Americans, Muslim Americans, and plain old “regular” Americans who care about innocent human lives — is indescribable right now.

I’ve looked into abyss and seen my reflection...

It’s been years since I’ve been to most of the place on the list. The most recent is probably Dominos, maybe two years ago, as I live in a “pizza desert” with few delivery options and the first few years of parenting we found ourselves in dire need of a place that would provide something edible and preferably hot.

It’s funny because I had a similar conversation regarding American food production just yesterday. The government should be busy focusing on lots of things... but those things unfortunately don’t get anyone reelected.

Therein lies the problem. It will be extremely difficult for domestic auto makers to compete on price because China is pouring tens of billions of dollars into subsidies to help their EV products dominate the global market. Americans love to complain about or be afraid of China, but when it comes to our pocketbooks,…

I like your energy, and your list. One possible edit would be to add Chipotle to it. Everyone knows Taco Bell is, well, Taco Bell. But Chipotle’s brand operates under the guise of a higher quality product, which may delude customers when in reality it is frankly equally embarrassing to be going to a Chipotle if you…

Today the slogan “it’s not TV, it’s HBO” feels like it can only be said with bitter irony. For me, over the past year Apple has definitively wrestled the crown away from HBO (sorry, “MAX”) as the destination for quality content. I can only think of perhaps two shows in the current HBO roster I’d count as “must see…

Man for a hot minute Alien Nation was my favorite show. I remember it being excellent but I’ve never gone back to watch it and have no interest in grainy youtube videos. Part of me wants to see if I can find it somewhere, but another part wants to just remember loving it and not risk discovering it was actually…

Or at least the guy whose hubris is responsible for a bunch of other deaths.  

That’s from the phone call as she’s walking into the high school and juggling the conversation with the nurse with the police radio.