I don’t know what’s wrong, but I’m not well today. Had to call in sick and stay home.

These are dangerous times. Fanatics from both Islamist and atheist camps are putting us all in fear. It’s important to keep two things in mind here.

• Burning the Koran is an expression of bigotry and Islamophobia.
• Burning the Koran is protected under free speech and must remain legal.

Björn Söder, the Swedish far-right’s top clown, has once again criticised Pride and linked gay people to paedophilia. People seem surprised. The opposite would be surprising.

In this tweet, a far-right woman expresses her concern for people who bring their children to Pride. Apparently, she thinks there are some really fun things going on there. In my experience, Pride is quite boring, vanilla, and straight.

Bigots and homophobes in the Religious Zionism party are causing some Israeli men to do remove their knitted kippas so they are not associated with the extremists, Haaretz reports.

This is why I’m a dog person.

From Kos:

We liberals have long argued that Jesus was liberal. It’s amazing that upon coming to that same realization, these conservative congregants don’t rethink their hateful ideology to better align with the teachings of their god. Instead, they declare the teachings of Jesus as “liberal talking points,” call him “weak,” and then cast him aside as anachronistic.

It’s that time of the week again. 🕯🕯

Well…

The night shift at the alarm centre is usually busy and chaotic. This night, however, has been very calm. I think the summer holidays are over.

All the news are depressing. War, Trump, Putin, Musk, conspiracy theories gaining support, homophobia on the rise, out-of-control hurricanes and wildfires, natural catastrophes all over. I have chosen to hide in my mental cocoon.

By the way, don’t forget to follow me on Mastodon. I intend to make it my primary social.

Flevoland was created by the Dutch in the 1980s. Land taken from IJsselmeer, situated six metres below sea level. Protected by human-made sea walls and massive water pumps.

“Even though Musk is not technically a diplomat or statesman, I felt it was important to treat him as such, given the influence he had on this issue,” a Pentagon spokesperson tells the New Yorker. Ronan Farrow has written a quite unsettling article about X-Musk’s importance in combating Putin’s invasion of Ukraine.

The man who attempted to topple Putin has now died in a plane crash not far from Moscow. It’s astonishing how so many men who betray Putin face these accidents.

Well, the world will hardly be a worse place without Prigozhin. He was a madman with much blood on his hands.

So now it’s been confirmed, Prigozhin died in that plane crash. One maniac down, at least one to go.

On this day, 24 August, Ukraine commemorates the country’s independence from the Soviet Union.

I’m at 91kg. Down 31kg since my peak in December last year.

I had some time to spend, so I made an image to promote my new presence on Mastodon. Don’t have many followers there yet, but I hope more people will migrate to the fediverse not that Meta’s Threads is set to join. The centralised platforms where our data a collected must be challenged. I mean, when you read the fine print, you realise that X-Twitter and Facebook own everything you put on their servers, including photos and artwork you have made yourself.

Follow me at: @aqurette@mastodon.social

“Police near Toronto have warned drivers to keep their car windows closed after a truck spilled crates carrying five million bees on to a road,” the Guardian writes.

“Canada has updated its travel advisory for the United States to warn LGBTQ travellers that they are at risk of being affected by state and local laws, amid a recent surge in state-level legislation targeting the community,” Washington Post reports.

The Epoch Times is not the most reliable source, but something tells me that this story is true. Trumpism is more than a presidential campaign—it’s a cult.