Est. 2026 · Vol. I · The Daily Grievance
Grump News
"The worst thing that happened to me today that you NEED to know about. And some other news stuff."
❖ The Gripe ❖
A Personal Affront, Reported Faithfully
Researchers tested two hundred and twelve plant based products off the shelf in the UK. Burgers, the vegetarian chicken, the oat milk you started buying to feel responsible about something. Every single one had a fungal toxin in it. Nineteen different kinds turned up, some products carrying more than one. All of it under the official safety limit, and the lead researcher wanted it on the record that nobody should be frightened, since these toxins occur naturally and cannot really be avoided, they simply have not worked out yet what it adds up to over the years. Two hundred and twelve for two hundred and twelve. I switched to the healthy option out of guilt, and it turns out guilt was the only thing that changed.
❖ The Damage Report ❖
Today's News, Ranked By How Much It Ruined My Mood
🔥 Most Enraging
NASA's Roman Space Telescope launches tomorrow, built to photograph a hundred times more sky than Hubble's field of view at the same sensitivity. Hubble has spent thirty years on about a tenth of one percent of the sky. Roman goes after the rest, plus the dark matter and dark energy that number was supposed to help explain. I have lived in the same house for decades and could not tell you what is behind the water heater. Some of us cover less ground.
😩 Most Exhausting
A venture capital firm announced a one point one billion dollar fund to, in their words, open the throttle on the physical buildout of AI, meaning chips, cooling systems, data centers, and real estate. They are calling faster memory and better interconnects a social and national imperative. I have called a slow toaster an outrage and been asked to calm down. Different scale of imperative.
😤 Unreasonably Annoying
A Richmond doctor woke from a dream about a mouse trying to get into her mouth to find an actual bat on her face. Her husband caught it. She went to the emergency room anyway, because bat teeth are small enough that you cannot always tell if you were bitten, and rabies does not forgive a guess. It tested negative. I lock the door against nothing in particular and still wake up certain something got in.
🤷 Somehow Also Happening
An Indiana sheriff's department spent four hours searching for two lions after a resident reported a three hundred pound lioness wearing a blue harness, traveling with a cub, before losing sight of them. Deputies, a neighboring sheriff's office, state police, and thermal drones found nothing. No zoo reported missing lions, and nobody nearby holds a permit to keep one. The sighting is still unconfirmed. Four hours of trained professionals, and the harnessed lion remains a matter of faith.
❖ And Some Other Stuff ❖
Briefly, And With Limited Enthusiasm
▸ Chimpanzees have been hurling rocks at the same trees for more than a decade — Researchers have watched the same chimpanzees in Guinea-Bissau throw rocks at the same trees for more than ten years, building stone piles at the base while calling out and drumming on the roots. Nobody knows exactly why. Territory, communication, tradition, take your pick. A decade of hitting the same tree and calling it meaningful. I have hit the same drawer with my hip for a decade and called it a design flaw.
▸ Hugging Face is selling a $399 open source duck robot — An AI company is selling a three hundred ninety nine dollar robot duck that waddles, falls down, gets back up, and can be taught new tricks through reinforcement learning, with the entire design posted online for anyone to copy. It ships before Christmas. I own several appliances I still cannot program the clock on. The duck will out-learn my microwave within a week.
▸ Apple TV is raising its subscription prices again — Apple raised the price of Apple TV again, the fourth increase in four years, blaming part of it on memory chip shortages caused by demand for AI data centers. The subscription costs more now because a warehouse somewhere needs the chips more than I need to finish a show. I have never once gotten a discount for wanting something less.
I've done my part. Now you suffer.
— The Grump · (and Larry)
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