Thursday no Thruway

Good afternoon, friends of Stroock's Books. Autumn is here in full force with cool, even cold temperatures. Every day, mornings and afternoons grow darker and darker. 

After doing some light school board canvasing yesterday and hitting the gym we got a touch of plantar fasciitis in our left foot. Damn it all. 

A bill to annex Judea and Samaria passed its first reading in the Israeli Knesset (opposed by Netanyahu and Likud). Vice President Vance is correct, the bill a dumb political stunt. Trump is right to condemn the bill. Meanwhile Israeli finance minister Basil Smotrich basically called the Saudis a bunch of camel jockeys. The man is toxic, and the sooner he is out of the cabinet, the better. Israel needs an election, which Netanyahu would probably win. Do it, Bibi. Dissolve the government. 

The New York Post has a good writeup on yesterday's Rutgers-Eagleton poll showing Mikie leading Jack 50-45. Whoa, we didn't see the polls 4.7 percent margin of error. They don't know. They really don't know. This is a turnout race, an enthusiasm race. The GOP is enthused. We see more Jack signs popping up. Are the Dems enthused? Anyway, the Dems ain't acting like they got a comfortable lead. 

We did not see the NYC mayoral debate last night. We shrug indifferently. New York City is asking for Mamdani. New York City deserves Mamdani. Returning Manhattan to the Native Americans has long been an official platform plank of this blog. The time has come...IYKYK.

At PJ Media a good article on the rise of NewPub, the indy publishing houses and authors who are challenging the calcified, feminized publishing industry. The article notes Raconteur Press, publishers of Hooves, Tracks, and Sabers, in which we have a story, thank you James Young. 

We've published four (soon to be five) short stories in anthologies now. See also Thin Red Tales (look at us, on the cover with S.M. Stirling), Violent Blue Yonder, and Those in Peril (nominated for a Sidewise award). After reading the PJ Media article last night we skimmed our stories and came away quite pleased. 

DOGE report: We cracked the code. We unlocked the achievement on how we want to write the grand Irish counterattack. So that's good.

However and LOL. Yesterday when researching World War 1990: Thatcher's War we realized none of the interstate like motorways crisscrossing Ireland today existed in 1990. In 1990, Ireland was still a Third World country. We had the British army advancing into Ireland on four lane highways which did not yet exist. The Brits would be advancing along two lane and in some cases single lane country roads. This is not a huge problem to fix. We think we can do the rewrites with Google Earth but may need to order a 1990 era Irish road map.