Thalfon

Gastronauts has done a casting call for season 2 already, and I think the loss of PIBE had less to do with other shows taking its spot, and is more just on its own merits. It either wasn't successful enough on Dropout (where so much of the marketing is things like insta/yt shorts/etc.), or Zach and Jess are prioritizing other things, or some combination of both. I don't think anyone official has really said. (I'm not even sure we officially know there won't eventually be a season 3.)

I definitely miss PIBE personally. I thought season 1 was pretty decent even though it got pretty badly panned in general, and season 2 was incredible. For what it's worth Zach and Jess did a 300 episode podcast called "Off Book" which is similar vibes.

I don't go in person to the library super often any more, but when I did I got in the habit of grabbing one book semi at random off the shelf. I say "semi at random" because it's probably from a section I enjoy (likely fantasy) and I'll quickly vet it as something I would at least possibly enjoy. But otherwise, just grab a random thing.

Pair that with a willingness to stop reading a book if you're not really into it, and sometimes you find gold where you'd normally not have thought to go looking. (A willingness to not be stuck with a book can go a long way toward making it easier to start one, in my experience.)

Pierre Poilievre, leader of the conservative party and our version of a Trump wannabe.

Last time I bought audiobooks I got them from Downpour which included DRM-free downloads as either MP3 or M4B files, in addition to listening through the website or app. I believe Libro.fm may also offer this. Most of my ebooks are through Kobo and are DRM free as well.

Does depend in some cases on the publisher.

It varies within the genre. Some games try hard to take steps to minimize the ability to sit around and grind, such as by a food clock or lack of respawns. Sil, which is a *band game that tries to be closer to the original style has an XP system that grants XP for seeing an enemy the first time, and the same for killing it, and then 1/n times that XP the nth time you see that same kind of enemy thereafter. Sixth orc you see is worth 1/6 the XP, so it's not worth farming an area hard, and still rewards exploring a lot. It also eventually just forces you deeper as the desire for a silmaril becomes more irresistible as you become stronger. Seeing 6 orcs and killing 2 is worth 3.95x an orc's stated XP, seeing 30 and killing them all gets up to almost 8x the stated XP.

Others like most Angband variants or Tales of Maj'eyal made the decision to just let the player grind. Many of the games in that style have more open-ended progression and aren't necessarily trying to force the player into constantly dangerous situations. The very popular Caves of Qud would fit this category.

It's not quite what you were asking for, but libro.fm -- which is American -- does give part of its profit from sales to a bookstore of your choosing, and you can select Canadian bookstores to receive that benefit. Not sure what the cut looks like exactly though.

Currently in a sci fi "Consider Phlebas" by Iain Banks, after seeing a recommendation for his books involving an optimism for the future. This was the one book available at my local library. Not far enough in to make a judgment on it, but enjoying it so far.

I have Our Share of Night by Mariana Enriquez also out from the library as a next up.

Recently read Rewitched by Lucy Jane Wood, which was a fun cozy urban fantasy. I think if I were to recommend such a book, I'd recommend The Very Secret Society of Irregular Witches above it, or recommend Legends & Lattes or The Spellshop for cozy high fantasy choices, but if you've read all the popular ones and are looking for more it's a great choice.

The judge's other main role in a trial with jury is to actually run the proceedings of the trial. Order of operations, keeping the two counsels in line, scheduling, etc.

Crypt of the Necrodancer.

Really fun roguelike game where you and enemies have to move to the beat of that floor's song. I think part of the reason I still play it a lot is that it's amenable to very short sessions. I've played enough that runs go fast and I either clear or die within 10 minutes.

Over 1200 hours now almost a decade after release, and a huge chunk of that is probably sessions of under 30 mins in length.

I only played the original one. I had a fair amount of fun with it for what it was. It can feel a bit empty and wide, but the gameplay was quite fun, even if the combat is kinda painfully easy most of the time. You can build basically however you want and become pretty OP.

Is the remake worth looking at for those who played the original? I was kinda ignoring it because I'd played through it once already. Wasn't super sold on a second go-through.

...I really did not expect to see Christy Clark on that list, even if at only 4%. If I'd seen her running as a Con, that would not have surprised me so much. Responsible in BC for legislating striking teachers back to work with the argument that they could not legally bargain on topics like class size, something that much later finally got thrown out by the supreme court. She was a member of the BC Liberals, which were really the right-wing party in BC at the time.

I'd wager both left- and right-leaning people in BC have some bad memories of that one for differing reasons. I certainly have to imagine she'd be a quick way to lose the existing liberal voters here.

I'm personally skipping because I already have what I'd want from this one, but I will say P4G is my favorite of the Persona series, and one of the few long JRPGs I've actually finished in the last several years. (P5R is also great, but 4's more grounded story and characters, relatively speaking, give it the edge for me.)

And Cassette Beasts is a truly great Pokemon-like that has so much going for it. If you feel out of love with the Pokemon franchise, or if you still enjoy it but would want more, this is a really fun game with its own take on a lot of the mechanics. Lots of depth combined with customizable difficulty.