dogs playing poker

The latest addition to Everlasting Blört’s expansive tribute Donald Trump is a piece of artwork that’s actually hanging in the White House—minus the Hieronymus Bosch (previously) background that lends an aesthetic merit not otherwise present.

The White House curatorial team has access to collections from museums around the world and can request any number of pieces be loaned for display on the walls of the residence and take the job of decorating quite seriously, given the symbolism and geopolitical undertones art can convey. The Republican Club (see the original here with the subjects labelled, Trump seated at a table joined by Richard Nixon, Abraham Lincoln, George W Bush, Ronald Reagan and Dwight Eisenhower—but caution as there is an accompanying video that automatically plays) somehow snuck in. Incidentally, the anonymous out of focus woman in the actual background of the painting represents the first Republican female president. Get more Daily Donald at Everlasting Blört here and at the link up top.

message received, noted, acted on

 “Pulling up at the door the very moment Madame was ready,” Weird Universe gives us a 1961 vision of things to come with a ride-hailing service with a fleet of mini-cabs were dispatched (at a third of the cost of a taxi journey) by radio-telephone, unlicensed operators prevented from accepting fares.

decorative gourd season

Building off an earlier exercise in training a neural network to conjure up extremely plausible sounding names for craft beer and small batch breweries, Janelle Shane (previously here and here) brilliantly tweaked the naming conventions slightly to infuse the results with pumpkin spice and other seasonal trappings. Here are some of our favourites but they whole beer menu is definitely worth sampling:

Bog Porter
Winter Winter This Dead Ale
Warmer Hollow
Ale Gore
Spice Prophecy
Pumpkin Disaster
Faceless Ole Ale
Winter Zuul

Check out AI Weirdness (aka Lewis and Quark) at the link above for more and to study the methodology and learn how to develop an artificial intelligence of your own.

vacancy announcement

Learning that the social media accounts of the newly elected Iraqi prime minister were absolutely inundated with over thirty thousand applications by those who wanted to join the government after taking to the medium to solicit for appointees, we were reminded of the concept of sortation—rule by lottery—we explored last week. Wanting to disburden himself from a fraught political past of sectarian tensions, corruption and nepotism, Adil Abd al-Mahdi was overwhelmed and heartened by the depth and range of independent applicants interested in cabinet positions, willing to work to rebuild the country.