skulblaka

Game of Thrones I think is one of the few exceptions to this rule. It still had plenty of story left to tell and the primary reason the 8th season was a bomb was because the showrunners were busy trying to wrap it up too quickly so they could go work on Star Wars instead. I think they could have taken the exact same half baked story ending that they had, stretched it out into ten seasons, and people would have complained a lot less. Would have been nice to have a better ending written but if they gave the one that they had the appropriate room to breathe, it would have been fine. Not great, but fine.

But wrapping that all up so quickly and suddenly is what put the nails in the coffin, in my opinion.

When I was a kid we had a dog named Monkey

In the South? Yes, definitely.

1. The Mexico border is down there. This is worrisome, not because of the Mexicans, but because ICE gangs like to hang out near the border to try and catch runners. A lot of them are tied up in northern cities right now kidnapping citizens but I wouldn't expect them to leave the southern border undefended.

2. It's extremely hot as fuck right now. Further south you go the worse it gets. I'm ~600 miles north of Orlando and it was 109F outside today (that's about 43C) with over 50% humidity. When you pass through my home state of Louisiana you'll be seeing closer to 115F/80%. With heat that high and humidity content that high heat stroke becomes extremely easy. You'll be dealing with this from Florida through around maybe Texas where it starts to become a drier heat, with lower humidity, but places like Arizona used to hit 120F/49C before we were all talking about global warming.

3. Southern Americans (as in, Southerners in the US, not people who live in South America, I know it's confusing) are not all racist, but uh... you'll see more who are, than aren't. If you're any shade of brown you're going to have a rough time. If you speak with a "funny" accent you're going to have a rough time. Armed racists populate huge swathes of the southern and midwestern US. This is statistically more likely to be just upsetting rather than directly harmful in most situations, but I wouldn't want to roll those dice, it's still very possible to find people who would just abduct and kill a foreigner they don't like.

Currently speaking, your biggest problems in the American South right now as a foreign tourist are going to be local racism and ICE. The local racism has been around forever and is mostly tolerable if you don't take offense easily, but you can probably expect to be called some slurs right to your face in more than a few small towns. ICE is a newer and probably bigger problem at the moment. They have orders from the president to capture and deport more people than they will possibly be able to accomplish, so anyone who looks or sounds foreign and doesn't have three forms of ID on them to prove citizenship is increasingly likely to get bagged, tagged, and dragged to a blacksite somewhere. I'm not confident that a tourist visa (or even a work visa) is going to stop them, it's already been proven that actual valid citizenship doesn't stop them.

Like 10+ years ago I had a "private photos" app that would open up two completely different photo vaults based on what pin you entered. I didn't even think it was a big deal at the time because it makes perfect sense to do. I'm amazed that hasn't become standard practice in the meantime.

Flying in from outside the US during this time to then attempt to drive all the way across the South

Both. It's both. I hope they stay safe. There are like 4 different major threats to a foreigner on that route.

If you're already going in for the custom fit, may as well get one you're happy with

Sure, maybe. But my yard has frogs and fireflies in it and my neighbors' don't. That seems pretty empirical to me.

Van Go (beep beep)

Man I'm the complete opposite. I grew up in the hood, if you had nice things, you wouldn't have them for long.

Driving nice cars and wearing name brand clothes just states "I have more money than you and I'm proud of it" which is a) universally a dick move, especially when you drive that fancy car past a dozen homeless every day, and b) makes you a mark. Oh you're driving a Benz? You've probably got valuables in it, let's take a look.

Nowadays I still drive a beat up old car and wear off brand clothes, both because I can't afford better but I also don't want to even look like I can afford better for the above reasons. It's just being an ass and also putting a target on yourself.

His big "bombshell" was just

"Trump is in the Epstien files!!"

Yeah. No shit bud. We've had photos of them together for decades, that's obviously the reason he hasn't released the file.

Musk seriously thinks everyone in the entire world except for him has the intelligence of a washed up ketamine addict.

I've begun worshipping the sun for a number of reasons. First of all, unlike some other gods I could mention, I can see the sun. It's there for me every day. And the things it brings me are quite apparent all the time: heat, light, food, and a lovely day. There's no mystery, no one asks for money, I don't have to dress up, and there's no boring pageantry. And interestingly enough, I have found that the prayers I offer to the sun and the prayers I formerly offered to 'God' are all answered at about the same 50% rate.

-George Carlin