It’s here!! Thank you @JonAntoine @Diane_Warren @ArtistShare #GreggField and Team A for this priceless gift of a 1of 1 song recorded #ByRequest just for me! The new album is going to be fantastic! Become a backer at Artistshare.com ❤️

My son announced on Tuesday evening, during dinner, that for Halloween he wanted to dress up as a fart. I literally almost choked on the water I was drinking. He’s six years old. He was just sitting there, serious, with spaghetti sauce on his chin, saying: “I want to be a big brown fart cloud.” My husband looked at me like it was my job to handle the situation. I didn’t know what to say. Where do kids even get these ideas? I told him absolutely not. To pick something normal — a superhero, a dinosaur, anything else. He made that stubborn face that means “he’s never going to let this go.” He started explaining to me, with the utmost seriousness, that farts are funny, that everyone would laugh, and that it would be the best costume ever. I was exhausted after work, my head was pounding, and I lost my patience. I said: fine. You want to be a fart? Make it yourself. I’ll help you find the materials, but the rest is up to you. I thought he’d give up after ten minutes. He didn’t. He spent the next three days in the living room, working with brown and beige fabrics I helped him order, because apparently he needed “fart-colored tulle” — a phrase I never thought I’d say. He watched tutorials on my phone about how to gather fabric, asked me for help with the knots, but insisted on arranging every single layer himself. He got frustrated twice, was close to crying, but kept going. His little hands working carefully, his tongue between his teeth as he focused. Yesterday he finished. He put it on and strutted around the house, proudly showing it off to his father and grandmother, who both looked absolutely stunned. I thought I’d be embarrassed, but instead I felt a strange pride. My son said he wanted to be a fart, I told him to figure it out himself, and he… actually did it. He’s been sleeping in it for two nights. Two neighbors have already asked if I can make one for their kids, too. I told them he’s taking orders now. Eight dollars per cloud. He’s never been so confident in his life.

🚨 Republican Senator Susan Collins approved a $345M contract for armored vehicles. Weeks later, she received $50,000 from the company making the vehicles.

🚨 Republican Susan Collins voted to give ICE and Border Patrol $70 BILLION more. The same night, she voted against requiring ICE agents to wear body cameras.

That towel move is a real physical therapy technique called a self SNAG, and the speed of the relief tells you something most people never learn about their own neck. Muscle tissue takes weeks of loading to actually lengthen. So when stiffness vanishes in a few seconds, the muscle was never what changed. What changed is the signal your brain was sending to it. The small facet joints stacked down the back of your neck sit at roughly a 45 degree angle. When one of them gets irritated or stops gliding smoothly, your brain protects it by clamping down the surrounding muscles. That clamp is the stiffness you feel. The tissue underneath is usually fine, it's just being held under orders. The towel edge hooks under one vertebra. When you pull forward and up along that 45 degree joint plane while turning your head, you glide the joint through the exact motion it was refusing, with support the whole way. Your brain gets live evidence the movement is safe and drops the clamp. Physical therapists do the same glide with their thumbs and call it a SNAG, short for sustained natural apophyseal glide. Brian Mulligan, the New Zealand physio who developed the method in the 1980s, designed the towel version specifically so patients could run it on themselves at home. Which is why years of stretching can lose to thirty seconds with a towel. A stretch tries to overpower the brain's grip. A glide convinces it to let go.

After dinner at an American friend's house, I sought to fulfill my duty as a guest. A black iron skillet lay by the sink, crusted with the dark grease of ribeyes. I reached for the sponge. I poured a generous stream of green dish soap. Bubbles of purification bloomed. From across the living room came a sound like a dying bison. "NOOOOOOOOOOO—!!!" My host tackled me into the drywall. The sponge flew. Soapy foam landed harmlessly upon the linoleum. He scrambled to the sink, panting, shielding the iron pan with his trembling forearms as if shielding an infant from artillery fire. "What were you doing?!" he gasped, eyes wild with terror. "I was performing ablutions! Removing the foul oil with chemical foam!" "That's not foul oil, you lunatic! That's my great-grandfather's 1938 Lodge skillet! You almost committed an execution!" He turned the faucet. Only warm water. He grabbed a handful of coarse kosher salt and a chainmail scrubber, rubbing the black metal with the desperate tenderness of an archaeologist dusting a mummy. "No soap! Never soap! Soap strips the seasoning!" "Seasoning?! You cook with the ghosts of past beasts?!" "It's polymerized fat! Eighty-six years of bacon, butter, and triumph baked into a non-stick shield! If Dawn touches this iron, four generations of my bloodline die in vain!" I stared at the black relic. Not a cooking vessel. An altar of ancestor worship forged from unwashed pig grease. "A cursed heirloom passed down through the dynasty..." I whispered in awe. He dried it with a towel. He placed it upon the burner, set the blue flame on high, and rubbed a single drop of oil across the surface until it smoked. He bowed his head before the rising vapors. "Forgive him, Grandfather. He knew not what he did." He wiped his sweaty brow and turned to me, dead serious. "I'll take a bullet for you, brother. But if you ever bring bubbles near this stove again, I will bury you under the patio." I bowed deeply to the warrior and his greasy idol. "Understood. The oil gods shall remain unpurified."

Here's what's going to happen. Trump loses the midterms. He declares massive voting fraud, calls supporters to attack immediately. GOP refuses to accept results. FBI seizes ballots and voting machines within days. Results stall for weeks. Republican officials cancel results in lost districts, order new votes. Protests erupt. Troops deploy under the Insurrection Act. January 3, Congress refuses to seat the Democrats. This isn't prediction. It's pattern. They've already done each of these things.

A very good boy may have just earned his place in the church choir. During Mass at The Grotto’s annual Blessing of the Animals on Sept. 20, one husky couldn’t resist joining in when the music began. In a now-viral video filmed by attendee Blanca Gallardo, the pup lets out a series of enthusiastic howls as a priest sings — prompting the priest to walk over and hold a microphone near the furry vocalist. The moment has become an internet hit, with the Instagram Reel drawing 7.1 million views and 741,000 likes. The husky’s owner and identity were not initially known, though Gallardo said she attended the blessing with her own dog, Phoebe. The clip’s comments quickly turned the impromptu duet into a heavenly punchline. One viewer, @kindsi, wrote: “The priest sang, ‘all creatures of our God and King, lift up your voice and let us sing’ and the husky said ‘HaleAWOOOOOyah!’” Honestly, the dog was just following directions. The Blessing of the Animals took place at 3:30 p.m. in The Grotto Plaza. The annual event welcomes people and pets of all faiths and celebrates the “joy, beauty, love, fidelity, encouragement and comfort” that animal companions bring into people’s lives. And if this dog had anything to say about it, that comfort apparently comes with a powerful set of lungs. Today, on the Feast of St. Francis of Assisi, it seems only right that one enthusiastic husky reminded everyone at Mass that all creatures are invited to lift up their voices, even if that voice is an awe-inspiring “awoooo.” Read more at Churchpop.com! ✍🏻 Claudette Jerez 📹: IG @divine_phoebe

I have encountered this many times (not with a kid tho) someone in my window seat (I love a window seat) they say “just sit in my aisle seat” to which I always refuse and most often an argument ensues……so well done lady for standing your ground and dishing out a valuable life lesson in entitlement

A 6'3" man in Georgia knocked on my door holding a printout titled HOW TO BOW. His daughter was marrying a Japanese man. The groom's parents were flying in from Osaka. Dale had left Georgia once in his life. For a football game. "I want to do it right," he said. "Teach me." A MAN WHO SELLS TRACTORS WISHES TO HONOR MY ANCESTORS. I accepted. I warned him I would be strict. My teacher was strict. His teacher was stricter. That is how bowing survives. So for three weeks, every night, in Dale's garage, next to a bass boat, I taught a man who sells tractors how to bow. He was terrible. He bowed like a man looking for his keys. He bowed like a falling tree. On day 6 he pulled something in his back and bowed for two days with an ice pack duct-taped to it. He never missed a night. "Again," he said. Every time. "Again." By week three, Dale bowed beautifully. Thirty degrees. Hands at his sides. Eyes down. I was so proud I couldn't speak. The wedding day. The groom's father stepped out of the car. Mr. Tanaka. Small. Grey suit. Very serious. Dale stepped forward and bowed. Perfect. At the exact same moment, Mr. Tanaka thrust out his hand and said, loudly, carefully: "HOWDY, PARTNER." He had been practicing too. Six weeks. In Osaka. With YouTube. Dale's head went down. Mr. Tanaka's hand went forward. His palm hit Dale square in the forehead. Silence. Mr. Tanaka bowed to apologize. Dale stuck out his hand to apologize. They did this four more times. The bride was crying. Then laughing. Then the entire wedding was laughing. Finally Dale just hugged him. Mr. Tanaka, who has never hugged anyone, hugged back. Two fathers. Nine weeks of practice. Zero successful greetings. Best greeting I've ever seen. Mr. Tanaka texts Dale every morning now. One word. "Howdy." Dale bows to his phone.

I was so completely captivated by this arrangement that I almost forgot the original soundtrack even existed. Every transition flows so effortlessly from one section to the next—absolutely mesmerizing! 🎶✨

Trump: "We've gonna shove it up their ass ... They are a bunch of dumb son of a bitches" Remember when presidents had dignity? Here's a lowlight supercut from Trump's rally tonight in Ohio:

They have a full routine for this. Obviously not their first rodeo.

SORRY IF THIS OFFENDS RESTAURANT OWNERS, BUT THIS HAS GOT TO STOP. I sat down at a table last night, and there were no physical menus. Just a laminated QR code taped to the wood. I had to pull out my phone, scan the code, navigate a laggy menu website, put in my own order, and type in my credit card details. A runner brought the food to the table 20 minutes later. Then the digital checkout screen defaulted to a 22% tip prompt. FOR WHAT? You eliminated the host, eliminated the server taking orders, forced me to use my own mobile device and cellular data, and then asked for a 22% tip for order entry I completed myself? THAT IS NOT A HOSPITALITY EXPERIENCE. THAT IS AN UNPAID CUSTOMER WORKFLOW WITH A FORCED TIP PROMPT ATTACHED.

Anyways, here’s wonderwall… #cowpoke #yodel #country #western #tengallonhat

Hector went down with colic on Thursday night, and Nelson, who has never hurried in his life, walked the yard with him for an hour and a half. The farmer found him at ten, pawing, looking round at his own flank, dropping down and getting up again, which in a horse means his gut has stopped and you ring the vet and you walk him. You walk him so he does not roll, because a horse that rolls with a twisted gut can finish himself, and you walk him because walking sometimes shifts it, and you walk him because it is the only thing you can do and standing there is worse. The vet was forty minutes away. So the farmer put a headcollar on seventeen hands of trembling Cavalry Black and led him out of the shelter, round the yard, under the light, and the horse, who has walked in step beside a man for seventeen years, walked in step beside a man, with sweat coming through the thick new coat and his eye white at the corner. Nelson came out of the shelter behind them. A donkey walks when there is a reason to walk, and the reason is usually grass. He had been in his dry corner, in the straw, with the night exactly as he likes it, and he came out into the yard without being called, fell in on the horse's off side, and walked. The farmer did one lap. The donkey did one lap. The farmer did twenty laps and the donkey did twenty laps, at the horse's pace, two feet from his shoulder, and did not stop, and did not graze, and did not once look at the gate. When Hector tried to go down, the donkey was in the way. Not pushing. Standing where the horse wanted to drop, so the horse had to stay up. The vet came at twenty to eleven. He put a needle in the neck and the thing eased inside half an hour, which it usually does when it is going to, and Hector passed a load in the corner of the yard that the farmer said was the finest thing he had ever seen a horse do. The vet asked how long the donkey had been walking. The farmer said since ten. The vet said in twenty years he had seen a lot of people walk a colic and had never once seen anything else do it. By midnight Hector was eating hay, carefully, with Nelson next to him. The donkey had walked further in ninety minutes than he walks in a week, and he went back into the straw and lay down without looking at anybody. The farmer went in and sat at the kitchen table in his coat for a while. He is not a man who sits at the kitchen table in his coat. A horse has never asked that donkey for anything. The donkey has never been given an order. Somewhere in there they have come to an arrangement, and on Thursday night it was walking.

Think real hard for a bit. Trump circumvented Congress & shared nuclear tech w/Saudi Arabia only days after the murder of Jamal Khashoggi. Also do not forget that Jared and DJT both admittedly covered for MBS role in the killing. And MBS stated publicly Jared is in his pocket.

I can't think of a better cooking show since Julia Child's.

BREAKING: White House lawyers are warning that if a blue wave occurs in the midterms, the stress of being investigated, impeached, and turned into a lame duck on the global stage could give Donald Trump a heart attack or stroke.

5. Amazon chat support can override almost any return decision. The website can't. She said this is the escalation path most customers don't use because they assume the website's automated decision is final. "The return page on Amazon.com is automated. It applies rules. If the rules say 'no return' or 'return with shipping deduction' that's what it shows. There's no 'appeal' button. Most customers see the unfavorable result and give up." "Amazon chat support reached through the 'Contact Us' page or through the Help section has human agents with the authority to override automated decisions." "Scenarios where chat support can help:" "The return window is technically closed but you have a legitimate reason chat can extend it. The return shipping is being deducted but the issue is the seller's fault chat can waive the fee. You want a replacement instead of a refund chat can process the exchange. You received a defective item and the return page doesn't offer a satisfactory resolution chat can escalate." "The key phrase: 'I'd like to speak with someone about my return options for this order.' Be polite. Explain the situation factually. If the first agent can't help ask to escalate. Second-level agents have more authority." "She said at least 40% of the customers she helped in chat received a better outcome than what the website offered. The website applies rules. Chat agents apply judgment. The judgment is almost always more favorable."