Kim Scheinberg

A few days ago I was at the airport in Barcelona filling out paperwork to get VAT refunds for purchases made in France, Germany, and Spain The Spain administrivia was handled by a machine scanning a receipt and my passport — the refund hit my credit card before I landed in NYC — but the France and Germany refunds required forms that needed to be stamped, put in envelopes, and dropped in a mailbox right next to the processing area My oldest (27) watched as I tried three times to lick the envelope before realizing that that is not how envelopes are sealed anymore Feeling my age, I felt compelled to offer some history lessons, starting with "When I was a kid, luggage didn't have wheels..." Here's a pic of me and my boys having lunch at 9Reinas

@TheBreadmonkey@beige.party 20 kg ghee (use sparingly)

Trump Media has officially launched Truth API, its new paid data service providing faster access to Trump's Truth Social posts

Per the press release, Truth API gives firms "a direct, licensed, real-time feed of the platform’s most market-moving Truths"

It reportedly costs as much as $100k/mo

Setting aside just how illegal this is, anyone who buys this genuinely has zero understanding of Trump

His kink is betrayal. If you pay him for this service, he knows you're a sucker and he will absolutely punish you for it. Punishing supporters is one of the only things that gives him something approximating pleasure (see yesterday's NYT piece about what he did to Brad Karp after Karp bent the knee on behalf of Paul Weiss)

The real insiders (a rotating cast comprising his kids, cabinet members, etc) will get the real inside info while the people paying the fee will be rewarded for a few weeks/months then eventually grossly mislead

Subscribers deserve what's coming to them

Because I am an incredibly negligent parent, my oldest kid somehow made it to the age of 27 without ever having heard David Bowie's _Heroes_ But as the XKCD cartoon reminds us, there are on average 10,000 people in the US learning about something cool for the first time every day So today my kid got to enjoy his inaugural listen while standing at the Berlin Wall, which I guess kinda makes up for all my negligence

The VRBO we're staying at in Barcelona has a rather cool, unique feature The architect, Bonaventura Conill, was a disciple / colleague of Gaudi. When the building went up, it had four stories. Fifteen years later, two more stories were added. The apartment on the sixth floor is (I'm reliably told) the only residence in Barcelona where you can see both Casa Batlló (a spectacular view out the living room window) *and* Sagrada Familia (out the bedroom window) Bonaventura's grandson owns the unit, raised his kids here, and started renting it out after his kids moved out It's quite something https://vrbo.onelink.me/ItNz/3gq1187f

I did not know that when you get what's left of your steak "to go" in Berlin that they give it to you vacuum sealed [Aside, this is the best piece of steak I've had in Europe -- and we just spent four days in Paris]

So the person who hacked my email a couple of weeks ago used it to reset the pwd on my American Airlines account and charge 990,000 frequent flyer miles worth of airline tickets This is especially impressive considering there were only 562,000 miles in the account at the time [After a couple hours on the phone with AA and a trip to the police station to file a written report, I'm told the miles should be back in my account in a week or two. Fingers crossed] And yes, I spent most of the day upgrading any and every account I could find to 2FA

I wanted to post the pic of Bari Weiss and Sheryl Sandberg in Sun Valley (with Sandberg holding two copies of Fetterman's book) but I threw up in my mouth a little every time I tried to write the alt text

Just burn it all the fuck down: "DraftKings and Delta have launched SkyPicks™, a new free-to-play in-flight sports contest that gives eligible customers (21+) an interactive way to engage with sports while they travel." https://www.draftkings.com/draftkings-and-delta-air-lines-launch-skypicks-bringing-free-to-play-sports-experience-to-domestic-flights

NBC calling the race for El-Sayed https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/2026-election/abdul-el-sayed-wins-michigans-democratic-senate-primary-notching-midwe-rcna589750

I'm torn between "they absolutely did this on purpose" and "they are nowhere near competent enough to have done this on purpose" "A US government map of Africa mislabeled every country during a state department presentation at a ⁠global conference in Brazil ⁠this week, ​causing a stir among attenders who took screenshots and posted them online. Reuters viewed a video of the presentation given at the Aids 2026 conference in ⁠Rio de Janeiro, which shows the errant map displayed halfway during a presentation about the state department’s new health agreements. A Reuters analysis found the image of the map included ⁠in the presentation contained an artificial intelligence watermark that signals it was made with OpenAI tools. The company did ​not respond to a request for comment." https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2026/jul/30/government-map-mislabels-african-countries

@mattblaze@federate.social @Nshrubs@mstdn.social @ai6yr@m.ai6yr.org @smellsofbikes@mastodon.social @blogdiva@mastodon.social When I had shingles 20+ years ago the rash appeared on my chest. I stayed at home wearing nothing but completely unbuttoned shirts, totally open at the front. Slept without a top sheet Even a breeze coming into contact with that skin was agony

@wendynather@infosec.exchange They should allow an audience at this game

@briankrebs@infosec.exchange I'm an atheist who somehow weirdly believes in Mammon so my reaction to bitcoin theft is a giant yawn But I'm surprised this particular theft isn't shaving a double-digit percentage off the price of bitcoin. Coldcard users are the small-dollar hodlers (as you note, the average theft was one coin) who followed all the rules and did everything "right." This theft should be emotionally destabilizing for a few million users I'd have thought hitting the true believers (as opposed to the cynical institutional holders who understand that bitcoin is bullshit) would have a greater knock-on effect as panic sweeps through the cult But no. The price has barely moved

@ai6yr@m.ai6yr.org Hm Going to your profile and tabbing through your pinned posts works, though

Where do people go to talk about the ways in which they are broken?

@alisynthesis@io.waxandleather.com Alas, that's not a particularly useful solution for me today

I'm sure this is my MacBook Air optimizing for something, but for the life of me I can't imagine what 10 hours? AYFKM?

@WilmBoerhout@mathstodon.xyz Long sold out everywhere, but... https://www.ebay.com/itm/178222777855?_skw=thom+browne+shirt&itmmeta=01KV8ZP392NJH15JTGK23DGGSQ&hash=item297ee7c5ff:g:i98AAeSw8wtpP09S&itmprp=enc%3AAQALAAAA8GfYFPkwiKCW4ZNSs2u11xAWWJU9KpsSA8CTNhuAwcv2QQtjS%2Fu9mg4p4Oh8OcT4XgPCKfRYzBc53YoKkBGLGOoXaJXm6yWzUpbcHXmFhgL4EvOI5YJnpTbx0RMQaJkaLe6BWVwUrrO%2BdtIiozl%2BkYvKGYN8onJJDDBOIaEpvDHRwc2ixIOCf3CXravhlzOdL%2FBBildvpFZ1BpHcLiyx4rZwubPzCRcP4OVPCTlQwY3gDa%2BrOCLFvxlOrEHq32eU3Cg1tRJ3QdbSMuKOG4Ae3WOmwdKpAS6RZMHMG09xF0tG3G6U1jeE1gQMOLLcqe5sDA%3D%3D%7Ctkp%3ABk9SR9i02J_aZw&autorefresh=true

Finally got around to reading the NYT article about The Nerd Reich seeking absolution From religious scholars This excerpt brings to mind what is probably the best scene in The Sopranos — when Carmela consults a Jewish psychotherapist who tells her to, "take only the children, what's left of them, and go." She sits with it for a bit, then starts musing aloud about arranging lawyers and child support. He cuts her off telling her it's all blood money — he says he won't take Tony's money as payment from her, and she shouldn't take it either His words fall on deaf ears just as surely as did Rabbi Navon's https://www.nytimes.com/2026/09/29/us/anthropic-claude-morals-ai.html

Back in 2016 or thereabouts, my old boss was emailing me from a Board of Trustees meeting at Cornell. They were discussing (among other things) how to deal with reports of sexual assault on campus Back then, a big part of my job was to keep him from saying stupid shit. He shared his recommendation to me privately in one of those emails, and I told him he should never ever ever make that suggestion out loud where anyone could hear it. Even now I cringe just thinking about it In retrospect, his idea would have been better than whatever actually got decided in that room

In a world of frogs and scorpions, be neither. Glad these scorpion frames didn't suit me because I might have been tempted Kuboraum in Berlin makes some very interesting eyewear. My kid almost talked me into the stegosaurus frames. Almost

The line between discernment and purity test continues to mess with me I have two people in my life who, by almost any measure, are to my left politically and are doing far more local and global good than I am. They mentor, they canvas, they donate professional skills. One is a surrogate big sister to dozens of LGBTQ kids who first came out to them. Another is a prolific award-winning author who travels globally giving talks about ableism. Until recently, these people were role models and north stars. And yet... One just switched their very active newsletter to substack (and auto-subscribed me to it) The other posted a selfie wearing Meta glasses Look, I'm hardly one to judge. I fail many of my own purity tests and I don't think one can maintain friendships based on them. Their politics haven't changed. Their activism hasn't diminished. On balance, they are still stellar humans I don't think a substack should be a line in the sand. But it's breaking me a little

In most ways I think Europe is so much saner and healthier than the US — I would very much like to figure out how to move here — but there is one respect in which I remain the ugliest of ugly Americans: I am convinced that I could make a fortune selling Charmin and other such luxury toilet paper brands in Paris, Berlin, and Barcelona I know, I know, Europe has bidets (and older plumbing that makes US two-ply stuff untenable) but I wish I'd thought to pack a roll when I left NYC

AI is so smart

@ThisCJ@mastodon.nz InternetNZ! My god that takes me back. Is John Houlker still around?

@kjhealy@mastodon.social I think of Emily St John Mandel as the author who wrote an entire book about a hedge fund manager without ever using the words "hedge fund"

@ai6yr@m.ai6yr.org I have found more corroded batteries inside home-owned pinball machines than I can remember If people own 3+ machines, their batteries are fine. Those are hobbyists. But the people who own one machine as part of a larger game room? They don't even know their pins *have* batteries [Mine have been replaced with NVRAM chips]

@kjhealy@mastodon.social As someone who has never read Berlin, where should I start?

@ai6yr@m.ai6yr.org @Helenisenough@masto.ai @cookiesinheaven@m.ai6yr.org Now I want to know if you've heard _On The Radio_

This is a thing that I did not know was happening in Barcelona today when I booked our trip "The correfoc represents the driving out of evil spirits and symbolises the triumph of good over evil with the patron saint providing protection over the city. The fire and noise is believed to purify the strees. The Devils are cultural groups that dress up as devils and parade the streets during certain festivals in Barcelona. La Mercè is one such event. The devils run up the streets with bangers and handheld fireworks. Lots of bangs and fire is the order of the day. Fire breathing dragons (or at least sparkler-breathing dragons) also roam the streets with Devils skipping along with spiralling fireworks held in their hands." So should I be relieved that I will have all my familiar demons driven out of me, or concerned that new demons will ensoul me? As an atheist who hates crowds and especially fireworks, this might have been bad planning on my part https://www.barcelona.de/en/barcelona-la-merce.html

RIP to the legend of legends We lost one of the best ones "Singer-songwriter-actress Dolly Parton, whose glittering country music stardom was matched by her pop fame and popular parallel careers in film and TV, died on Aug. 25. She was 80 years old, with her family not releasing a cause of death, but saying she “died peacefully today in Nashville.” https://variety.com/2026/music/news/dolly-parton-dead-dies-country-music-1236842727/

I am in Paris with Kid1. The *only* thing K1 knew he wanted us to do in Paris was go to the Catacombs. He kept saying it'd be like walking through the Tomb in Blue Prince And because tix for the Catacombs go on sale exactly one week before one's preferred entrance time, I stayed up until an ungodly hour (in Las Vegas) to get the "first entry of the day" tickets. I am a Good Mom Three days ago, Kid2 decided he wanted to join us in Paris. His cousin is a pilot so he flies free standby on a major airline. And bc it's standby, he couldn't commit to which flight he'd be on. He managed to make it onto a flight last night Anyway, the Catacombs tix for me and K1 were for 45 minutes ago, and K2 arrives at the AirBNB in 5 minutes with no way to get in unless one of us is here waiting For the Blue Prince players, K1 (who is, alas, at the Catacombs without me) just texted me this

@jeridansky@sfba.social @Ashedryden@xoxo.zone I read _Sex Tips for Girls_ to tatters. I probably replaced it twice and can still quote from it despite not having picked it up in 30 years I loved _Charlotte's Web_ until I reread it as an adult and figured out that it's just a smarter version of _The Giving Tree_ Charlotte endlessly does for Wilbur (who can barely take care of himself) and artificially props him up to the world. By the time he finally -- finally! -- asks, “Why did you do all this for me?' I don't deserve it. I've never done anything for you" all I could do was shout, "Good fucking question!"

Buying a jigsaw puzzle from Germany with the disclaimer: "Die Ecken und Kanten des Dreieckskartons sind leicht angestossen." Per google translate: "...it is in very good condition, the poster is present, and the puzzle pieces are complete. The corners and edges of the triangular boxes are easily triggered." Tough time when even the packaging is struggling

@Bwacton@mastodon.social None of the dinners were as memorable as tonight's steak here in Berlin, but I had several of the best baguettes of my life from a place in Paris called Mimo the Baker And I'm pretty sure they must supply a dozen of the nearby restaurants because no matter what time of day we went in, they were piping hot out of the oven, and we saw several people walk out with 30 baguettes at a time Oh, and we had breakfast at La Grappe right across the street from Mimo that did perfect scrambled eggs, but I imagine that's easy to find in Paris

@ChrisMayLA6@mastodon.me.uk Mamdani has a level of charisma that few people -- Andy Burnham included -- can match. Yes, Trump likes winners (and tyrants) but I think what makes Mamdani successful with him is something more innate

RE: https://flipboard.com/@aljazeera/global-news-ds1mfku2z/-/a-LVpcofECTxOhrgYfD9uaFw%3Aa%3A3199698-%2F0 Notably, Al Jazeera includes a sentence that NYT would never: "The blazes in Europe have renewed questions about the impact of climate change."

@etp@indieweb.social He has his suitcase and his backpack, and it's not even 11am. But I hear ya'... [Also, it's a long flight from Las Vegas. He's understandably tired]

@ai6yr@m.ai6yr.org I grabbed the image you posted, re-uploaded it to Mastodon, used 'add text from image' and it mostly OCR'ed just fine. It only got truly squirrelly when it got to the bar Here's the unedited OCR output

After Anonymous leaked the evidence in the Steubenville rape case in 2013 — including the video of the rapists' friends laughing and joking while the rape was ongoing — I sat down with my oldest (then 14) and made him listen to the audio with me. We talked for a long time about what his responsibilities were if he should ever find himself in such circumstances That kid, who coincidentally graduated from Cornell a few years ago, is 27 now Seems to me that a lot of parents missed an easy opportunity to have a hard conversation with their kids about not being bystanders (never mind rapists) Incidentally, the rapists in the Steubenville case served a collective three years between them and went right back to playing football because boys' lives are sacred and girls matter not even a little bit https://www.espn.com/college-football/story/_/id/23473841/malik-richmond-youngstown-state-penguins-removed-sex-offender-list https://www.espn.com/college-football/story/_/id/13171184/ex-steubenville-player-convicted-rape-joining-hocking-community-college-team

I know we've been living in a world of Mad Libs headlines for a decade now, but... This cannot — and I mean CANNOT — be real "Harry Potter fans have forced a new multimillion-pound power cable between the UK and Ireland to be relocated after complaining it would desecrate the “grave” of Dobby, a fictional elf." https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2026/aug/10/harry-potter-fans-force-relocation-of-430m-undersea-cable-to-avoid-dobbys-grave

I read this line back in 2017. The US sure seems to have worked out how to turn a significant portion of men into compulsive gamblers "If you were the GDP, your ideal citizen would be a compulsive gambler with cancer who's going through a drawn-out divorce that he copes with by popping fistfuls of Prozac and going berserk on Black Friday." -- Rutger Bregman, _Utopia For Realists_