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I periodically check mini PC deals on Ebay. I came across an interesting one titled “Thinkcentre m73 Tiny 500GB HDD 16GB RAM i3-4150T Ubuntu Plus Guarana Fanta Soda” for $40.00. As you can see from the product image, ordering will net you the mini PC, the OEM plug, and a can of Guarana Fanta Soda. The seller describes the product as follows:

Lenovo Thinkcentre M73 with 500 GB HDD, 16GB RAM i3-4050T processor. Ubuntu is installed but the PC runs Windows 11 fine, you’ll just have to deal with Microsoft making it difficult to update it. You’ll also receive a can of Guaraná Fanta Soda.Guaraná is a fruit from the amazon.

This strikes me as a decent deal all things considered. $40 is a decent price, especially with the adapter. I would certainly replace the HDD with an SSD, but other than that it sounds like it should be good to go. The one caveat is that it has a 4th generation i3. You can find similar mini PCs with 6th and 7th generation i3 and i5 CPUs in the $50-$70 range. But depending on your use case, this mini PC could suffice, especially with the bonus soda.

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I just learned that Elmo, the popular red Sesame Street muppet, went “full Nazi” on X on Sunday, July 13, 2025 [Paul Rois for Breitbart, July 13, 2025]. To be clear, by full Nazi we mean in pro-Holocaust sense instead of the everyone I don’t like is Hitler sense. People are saying “Elmo” was hacked. This may be true. But I am not jumping to conclusions. See, I was not born yesterday. I am old enough to remember the video game magazine writers were all tingly about Conker, a little video game squirrel who was a selectable racer in Diddy Kong Racing and star of the children’s Game Boy Color adventure Conker’s Pocket Tales, reemerged on Nintendo 64 as degenerate potty-mouthed alcoholic in Conker’s Bad Fur Day. While I suspect that “the people” are almost certainly correct in guessing that Elmo’s X account was hacked, there is a tiny possibility that this is part of a dark, Conker-style re-branding (but with less alcohol and potty “humor” and more “just asking questions” and Nazis). Time will tell.

(Aside: My only video game experience with Conker came in Diddy Kong Racing. I never had any interest in playing Conker’s Bad Fur Day, but I remember that it was a hot topic in the video game magazines for several months.)

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From a July 8, 2025 New York Times article titled Should New York City Ditch Its Party Primaries in Favor of Open Races? (archived):

A special panel appointed by Mayor Eric Adams is formulating a plan that would scrap the current system in favor of an open primary where all the candidates — regardless of political party affiliation — would be on the ballot.

Speaking as someone whose only vote in the 2025 New York City primaries was for Peter Kefais for Comptroller, I oppose this idea. As a threshold matter, I oppose open primaries in principle even though doing so arguably does not accrue to my benefit in New York City. But my first thought when reading the article implicated a more specific opposition in line with that of City Council Member Joann Ariola:

Republicans have also criticized the idea, arguing it would hurt their candidates. Joann Ariola, a Republican City Council member from Queens, said it would ‘effectively usher in one-party rule.’

To be sure, New York City has effectively had “one party rule” since 2013. With that being said, I second the idea behind Council member Ariola’s critique. Count me as a vote for going back to normal primary elections instead of making them weirder.

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I came across an article titled Google can now read your WhatsApp messages, here’s how to stop it (HT Hacker News). While I am sure that the article’s advice is sound, I know with 100% certainty that Google has never read my WhatsApp messages. I have a secret method for ensuring that no one can ever read a WhatsApp message from me. My secret is proprietary (just like WhatsApp).

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From a report by Michael Larabel at Phornix:

For fans of the Markdown text markup language, the two decade old standard is finally seeing nice import support being worked on for LibreOffice Writer. Merged this morning was the initial patch for reading Markdown files into Writer using a new filter. That was followed by this commit implementing more of the Markdown elements like paras, lists, and headings.

Michael Larabel

I draft New Leaf Journal articles in Markdown and then edit them in LibreOffice Writer before copying them to WordPress (see my WordPress writing workflow). I use Ghostwriter’s Pandoc export to convert my markdown drafts to .odt (see my review of Ghostwriter). While my current workflow works well, I look forward to being able to open markdown files in LibreOffice Writer when the feature makes it into a stable release.

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I delete many spam comments left in our Guestbook. Most are not worth sharing, but every now and then I see one that catches my attention. One example is a spam comment that has now been left for moderation for posting in our Guestbook twice. The comment is posted by user killer for hire and it advertises a service which “lets you find experts for occasionally dangerous tasks.” It states that “contractors are qualified in managing complex jobs” before a URL, which includes the words hitman, assassin, and killer. “This service ensures safe interactions between requestors and specialists.” What in the world? I would have posted the screenshot but I would rather not indirectly advertise the actual URL. I did not click the URL, but there is a non-zero chance it leads to a casino or marijuana site. Weird stuff.

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I was looking for a good small web source to link to April showers bring May flowers for yesterday’s New Leaf Journal article on a brave tulip in Red Hook. I turned to Marginalia Search and Mojeek for the task. On Marginalia, I found a link to a link to a May 10, 1998 blog post by Michael Rawdon titled May Flowers. It did include the adage. I did not ultimately use it in my article. However, a passage unrelated to spring and flowers caught my attention:

Oh, and I ordered my new G3 Macintosh from The Apple Store. They say it could be up to 3 weeks before it arrives due to “time for assembly”, but seeing as it’s a standard model minus the internal modem, I’m betting it will arrive sooner.

Michael Rawdon (May 10, 1998)

While I never had a Mac of any kind (lest we count my temporary custody of Victor V. Gurbo’s 2007 MacBook), the passage caught my attention because I wrote about one Macintosh G3 just over a year ago. In Power Macintosh G3 in Nana Anime, I used a reverse image search to identify a desktop computer in a 2006 anime I was watching at the time. Of course, the G3 I wrote about was first released on January 5, 1999, so Mr. Rawdon must have ordered the model before the one I covered.

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I read an April 28, 2025 report in Morning Brew titled LTK wants to be creators’ post-social platform of choice. I had heard of L DK, but never LTK. Is it new?

Amber Venz Box started as a creator on WordPress, and founded the platform formerly known as LiketoKnow.it and RewardStyle in 2011 as an affiliate platform for bloggers, which is now often cited as one of the original social commerce platforms.

It is apparently not new. Maybe it is niche?

Internal data shows that most LTK affiliate transactions now happen through or within the LTK platform (as opposed to, say, a link from a social post) and around 38% of millennial and Gen Z women in the US are using LTK, Venz Box said.

According to this, many millennial women are using it. I am obviously not a woman, but I have dated myself as a millennial by birth. Nevertheless, I never heard of this supposedly popular platform. Its being focused on affiliate advertising may explain why. I am good at being ignorant of advertising trends and video creators. While I have no opinion on LTK, I do have one take on one opinion of Amber Venz Box, the creator of LTK:

Ultimately, she said, she doesn’t want to see TikTok go away, particularly due to the platform’s power in democratizing who can become a creator.

 

TikTok should definitely go away.

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I was walking through the Brooklyn neighborhood of Cobble Hill in the late afternoon on April 21, 2025. I heard a tap-tap-tap in a tree. I looked up and saw a woodpecker with a red crown and white breast with spots pecking away. This was notable because it is only the second time I recall having seen a woodpecker in Brooklyn, with the first being in Park Slope/Gowanus one or two years ago. I pulled out my camera to take a photograph of the woodpecker. Unfortunately, it flew away and across the street before I could even open my camera app, much less take a picture. Thus, the woodpecker joins the blue jay and black squirrel, albino sparrow, and squirrel with a French fry on my tell, don’t show list of New York City wildlife stories.

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This Week in Anime - Sophomore Slump (Anime News Network)
Coop and Chris try to answer the eternal question: does it matter if the sequel is as good if it takes too long to show up?

I came across an interesting Anime News Network discussion prompt asking whether it “matter[s] if the sequel [to an anime] is as good [as the first season] if it takes too long to show up?” The two participants in the discussion cite examples where it does seem to matter in a commercial sense. From my perspective, a long delay between seasons can be irritating in that I need to go back and refresh myself on the prior season(s). I distinctly recall having that issue with the second season of Re:Zero back in 2021 (the first season aired in 2016). But as long as the new season is good and worthwhile, I am not worried from a viewer perspective. The third and final season of My Teen Romantic Comedy SNAFU (aka Oregairu) was the easy choice for my TV anime of the year nod in 2020, notwithstanding the five-year gap between the second and third seasons. I still insist on a third season of the best series of the previous decade, March Comes in like a Lion, despite the fact that the second season finished airing seven years ago. (Aside: While I have yet to watch the third season of Kimi ni Todoke, which aired 12 years after the second, I appreciate that it helped bring attention to my Kimi ni Todoke hair color study.)

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From Reuters:

Chinese producers of plastic Christmas trees and other festive decorations say orders from U.S. clients, which are crucial for their business, should have started to come in by now. But because of surging import tariffs, they haven’t.

[Reuters, April 10, 2025]

I never had a plastic Christmas Tree. But I recall having said something about the fact that they tend to come from China to a friend a few months ago. Should the center-piece of many Christmas living roons be made in a country that persecutes Christians as a matter of state policy?

In cheerier Christmas Tree news, I published many fun Christmas Tree links in Newsletter Leaf Journal 166, which hit inboxes and feed readers on December 23, 2023.

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Earlier today, I posted about the 65-year old Fred Couples shooting one under par in the first round of The Masters and thus placing him in good position to break his own record as the oldest golfer to make the cut at Augusta National. But while Mr. Couples may become the oldest golfer to make a Masters cut, he will have to leave the record for oldest golfer to have a Masters round. I quote from ESPN UK:

Fred Couples, who wondered a month ago if at 65 with a creaky back he would still be welcomed to play, became only the second player that age to break par … Tom Watson was also 65 — by 28 days he is still the oldest — when he shot 71 in 2015.

[ESPN UK, April 10, 2025]

I do not think I knew that record. However, Mr. Watson featured prominently in my article on the oldest golfers to contend at major championships, notably for his near-win at the 2009 Open Championship at age 59. While I did not recall Mr. Watson’s 71 in 2015, I did make a note of his performance at the 2010 Masters coming off almost winning the British Open nine months earlier.

Tom Watson did not contend for another major, but he would make the cut in five majors after turning 60. His best showing was a tie for 18th place at the 2010 Masters, wherein he was one shot behind the leader – Fred Couples (age 50) – after a first round 67.

Mr. Couples finished sixth at the 2010 Masters after leading at the end of round one. He narrowly missed my cut-off criteria for oldest golfers to contend at majors (my criteria was (1) older than 48 years, 4 months, and 18 days; and (2) top-five finish or within five shots of the winner).

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I noted in an article on the oldest golfers to contend for major championships that Fred Couples has always been a favorite of mine (thanks in no small part to Fred Couples Golf for Sega Game Gear). Mr. Couples is 65 years old, having reached the milestone on October 3, 2024. While he competes almost exclusively on golf’s 50-and-over Champions Tour these days, he is competing in his 40th Masters this week with his lifetime exemption from his 1992 victory. Mr. Couples shot an impressive (in general, but especially for a 65-year old) one-under 71 in the first round, thanks in large part to a chip-in birdie on the first hole and holing out from 191 yards for eagle on the par-four 14th. While I would be surprised to see Mr. Couples close enough to the lead on Sunday to qualify as a new addition to my oldest golfers to contend for major championships list, he is in good position to break the record for the oldest golfer to make the cut at the Masters. The record holder is Fred Couples, who set the existing mark in 2023. But Mr. Couples may not control his own record destiny. The 67-year old Bernhard Langer (1985 and 1993 Masters Champion), who is competing in his final Masters, shot a two-over 74, which gives him a chance to make the weekend in his farewell Masters if he posts a solid second round tomorrow.

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I read an article on Liliputing about Tinker WriterDeck OS earlier today (Liliputing. April 7, 2025). What is Tinker WriterDeck OS? I turn to Liliputing:

But if you’ve already got an old laptop lying around, maybe there’s no need to build or purchase anything new. You could just use distraction-free software. And that’s exactly where Tinker WriterDeck OS comes in: it’s a free and open source operating system that can be installed on just about any old laptop that you may have lying around to turn it into a distraction-free tool for writing… and not much else.

I happened to have a very old ASUS netbook (2 GB RAM, spinning HDD) laying around. Moreover, I had nothing much to do with it given that I have two more capable laptops. There was only one thing to do…

ASUS netbook showing the tilde text editor in Tinker WriterDeck OS on first boot.

This is admittedly not the best picture, but rest assured that this is Tinker WriterDeck OS freshly installed on my netbook. I was impressed with how quick and easy the installation was, thanks in no small part to very concise docs. I confirmed everything works. Look forward to an exciting article about Tinker WriterDeck OS drafted on my newly configured netbook.

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I have heard of Tinder, but I have not used Tinder (or any other dating app or service for that matter), so all I know about it is what I read. I had been under the impression that Tinder was a dating/hook-up app for people to meet or meet other people. However, I was disabused of this notion by an April 2, 2025 report by Matty Merritt for Morning Brew titled Tinder wants you to win a date with an AI chatbot (Morning Brew, April 2, 2025). I quote from this important report:

Users receive a virtual deck of cards with unique scenarios and personae to flirt with via the speech-to-speech tech. The goal is to charm the bot with voice memos and score a date before time runs out…

The article notes that Tinder launched the game on April Fools. Sadly, it seems to be no joke (as in existing, it is definitely a joke in a grander sense).