'I love him, I love his family and I love what he’s done for the country'

'Run out of time'

Rachel Minaya was reportedly found dead Saturday

Mel Gibson is so back in the trailer for "Monster Summer"

'This unprovoked attack is a stark reminder of the dangers our law enforcement officers confront'

The post When an Aloof Cat Becomes a Lap Cat: Olga’s Rocky Transition by Christopher Bays appeared first on Catster. Copying over entire articles infringes on copyright laws. You may not be aware of it, but all of these articles were assigned, contracted and paid for, so they aren't considered public domain. However, we appreciate that you like the article and would love it if you continued sharing just the first paragraph of an article, then linking out to the rest of the piece on Catster.com. Hi, I’m Christopher! Read my introduction to learn more about me and my silly Russian Blue cat, Olga. Before I adopted Olga, I lived with a friendly Siamese cat who rarely left my side. I quickly learned that Olga wasn’t a lap cat, and it took her a while to warm up to me. She used to greet me at the door when I came home from work, and she has always enjoyed playing with cheap toys, like paper balls, but she wasn’t fond of petting or any form of grooming. She’s much friendlier and more vocal now, but it was a slow transition. For a few years, she slept in a chair in my bedroom before wandering over to the foot of the bed. When she was young, she was always friendly to visitors but wouldn’t let them pick her up; she preferred laying on their feet. I noticed that you don’t have any books on cats. Olga’s Early Years Although she was usually gentler to strangers, she wasn’t afraid to strike them if they petted her back or tried to rub her belly. Living with an aloof feline isn’t for everyone, but some prefer it. It requires less effort since you don’t have to give them as much attention. It took me a long time to convince Olga that human contact was beneficial. Another owner may have decided to give up on her and allow her to hide under the bed for most of her life. I irritated her into liking me. She attacked me every time I picked her up, but when I started picking her up and carrying her into the kitchen for dinner, she learned to relax. Nowadays, when I turn off my computer in the evening, she jumps in my lap and anxiously awaits her trip to the dinner bowl. Bribing her with food was an effective way to make her less resistant to being picked up, but I didn’t do anything to convince her to sleep in my lap. She doesn’t seek lap naps as often as my other cat and cannot tolerate human contact for long. Did you say dinner would be late? That’s unacceptable. Lap Nap Anxiety Olga rarely sleeps on anyone’s lap for more than ten minutes, and sometimes, when she wakes up, she looks confused and quickly runs away. I don’t know whether it’s because she’s embarrassed she was too friendly or concerned that her bonding time was interfering with her alone time. She had a violent reaction once when she was a few years old. She fell asleep on my legs with her head and front paws hanging off the chair, and when she woke up, she nearly fell. Instead of sliding off, she hopped up and attacked my feet with her claws and fangs. She doesn’t assault me anymore, but she still has a terrified look on her face when she awakens in my lap. Some independent felines may never learn to love interacting with humans, and it can take years for an aloof cat to transform into a lap cat. It requires patience and helps if you have a high threshold for pain. Olga spends a few hours meditating under the couch every day, but she spends most of the day beside her favorite, annoying human. The post When an Aloof Cat Becomes a Lap Cat: Olga’s Rocky Transition by Christopher Bays appeared first on Catster. Copying over entire articles infringes on copyright laws. You may not be aware of it, but all of these articles were assigned, contracted and paid for, so they aren't considered public domain. However, we appreciate that you like the article and would love it if you continued sharing just the first paragraph of an article, then linking out to the rest of the piece on Catster.com.

Books Five Books Five SFF Stories Driven by Soul-Crushing Debt Some heroes are chosen by gods or wizards; others are just trying to escape desperate perilous financial straits and survive a broken system… By James Davis Nicoll | Published on July 22, 2024 Image by freepik Comment 0 Share New Share Image by freepik Heroism, a keen awareness that with great power comes great responsibility, ambition, visiting wizards in the company of dwarves… all excellent motivations to propel protagonists out of their comfortable living rooms and into adventure! If you really want to push your characters into embracing high-risk ventures, however, you cannot beat the motivational power of crushing debt1. Appleseed by Masamune Shirow (1985–1989) AI Prometheus rose in the aftermath of World War Three to restore order to a shattered world. Prometheus’ genetically engineered “bioroids” are conditioned from birth to serve loyally. This leaves the matter of non-bioroid recruits like Briareos Hecatonchires. How best to ensure compliance with Prometheus’ needs? Crushing debt! Briareos is a cyborg. The machinery that constitutes much of his body is highly advanced, but not so advanced that it repairs itself. Repairs are not free. Prometheus chooses not to foot the repair bills for employees. After all, if cyborgs are desperate to keep their bodies functioning, the less prone they will be to ask awkward questions. Obviously, Prometheus desires only the greatest good for the greatest number. Nevertheless, it’s useful to keep staff members too distracted to protest actions like confiscating prosthetic limbs in war zones or to ask questions like “If Prometheus is so awesome, why is the bioroid suicide rate so high?” The Ghost Bride by Yangsze Choo (2013) Colonial Malaysia’s wealthy Lim family has a small problem. Lim Tian Ching needs a wife. While Tian Ching’s personality isn’t all a bride could hope for, the advantages of marrying into the Lim family would normally be sufficient distraction from Tian Ching’s less charming qualities. However, Tian Ching is dead. Few women will marry a corpse, even one with a ghost as active as Tian Ching’s. Li Lan might be the exception. Her widower father, consumed by grief and opium, has massive debts. Once, Li Lan was engaged to Tian Ching’s cousin Tian Bai. Tian Ching’s death elevated Tian Bai to family heir, too high status for a woman like Li Lan. She seems an ideal candidate on whom to foist Tian Ching. If she objects? The Lim family owns her father’s crushing debts. If you’re thinking that the plot sounds a bit different from the 2020 television adaptation of The Ghost Bride, that’s because some liberties were taken while adapting the novel. As they usually are. Brother’s Ruin by Emma Newman (2017) Great Britain’s Society for Esoteric Arts sweetens impressment with bribery. Candidates have no choice about joining if “invited,” but the Society does monetarily compensate candidates’ families in proportion to the draftee’s abilities. The Gunns could be rescued from debt-ridden precarity by the Society, if only young Benjamin Gunn were the mage that his sister Charlotte is, or if Charlotte wanted to be press-ganged by the Society. Since she does not, Charlotte must somehow create the appearance that Benjamin is her equal… while simultaneously fending off the predatory loan sharks to whom the Gunns owe their crushing debts. Readers might wonder how prudent it is for criminals to target and blackmail families with at least two mage-candidates. The criminals have also pondered this question, which is why they count among their numbers moonlighting mages more experienced than either Gunn sibling. Black Water Sister by Zen Cho (2021) US medical debt collection is relentless but not global. Accordingly, when faced with crushing debt in the form of impossible-to-pay medical bills, Jessamyn Teoh and her parents return to Penang. Fleeing the US means leaving Jessamyn’s girlfriend Sharanya behind. How fortunate, then, that Jessamyn’s dead grandmother’s shade serves as a relentless distraction to the relocated protagonist. Death does not prevent Ah Ma from pursuing vendettas, particularly against billionaire Dato’ Ng Chee Hin. Dato’ Ng Chee Hin’s development plans are an affront to Ah Ma, and more importantly to the god—Black Water Sister—that Ah Ma served in life. Now Jessamyn must decide who she will anger: a well-connected oligarch or an angry god. Or both. I had assumed that American debt collectors had planetary reach, if not interplanetary. Apparently not. Interesting to know. Also irrelevant to single-payer health care Canadians2, unless by some chance Canadians were to spend decades electing to office politicians either uninterested in maintaining the system or actively hostile to it… What are the odds of that? The Princess of Thornwood Drive by Khalia Moreau (2023) An automobile accident killed Laine’s parents and left Laine’s sister Alyssa in a vegetative state, lost in an inner fantasy world. In the wake of the tragedy (for which Laine blames herself), Laine discovered that her father had left massive debts. Holding down a job while caring for Alyssa and fending off debt collectors seems a nearly impossible challenge. Enter Lake Forest Adult Day Center, whose offer of affordable daytime care is the lifebuoy Laine desperately needs. Lake Forest can provide Laine with the free daytime hours she needs for work. There’s also the prospect of a relationship with Lake Forest’s charming Doctor Robert Remson. If only Lake Forest didn’t offer something even worse than economic precarity. I expected the issue driving the plot to be medical debt, but while that is a factor, it’s the father’s crushing non-medical debts that dominate. Also, Laine has a shortage of something more precious: hours in the day. Of course, that’s a problem money can solve, so ultimately all of Laine’s problems come down to a need for more money. Debt is, of course, a wildly popular motivator in fiction and in real life3. There are many speculative fiction books that either feature debt or were motivated by it. Perhaps your favorite examples were not mentioned above. If so, please mention them in comments.[end-mark] Marc Miller, designer of the classic table top RPG Traveller, made debt a primary plot driver. Player characters needed to scramble to pay eye-watering bills each month. The only reason Richard S. McEnroe’s extremely Traveller-esque The Shattered Stars isn’t getting a mention here is because I cited it in a 2023 essay on this site. ︎Foresighted Canadians remember to sign up for valid insurance while visiting the US. ︎Although I suspect “five books written purely for the money” would not go over well as a review topic. Or would it? ︎The post Five SFF Stories Driven by Soul-Crushing Debt appeared first on Reactor.

DAILY CALLER NEWS FOUNDATION—Panama’s government is touting progress on efforts to reduce illegal migration through the Darien Gap, a dense jungle region that long has served as a gateway point for South American migrants making their way to the United States. The National Border Service, Panama’s version of the U.S. Border Patrol, reported that 11,363 migrants had crossed into the country from Colombia since July 1, when Panamanian President Jose Raul Mulino first entered office, The Associated Press reported. That number marks roughly 9,000 fewer crossings compared to the same period last year. Jorge Gobea, the National Border Service’s director general, credited the downturn in migration numbers to the construction of around three miles of barbed wire on five different trails frequently used by migrants passing through the Darien Gap, according to AP. Gobea also pointed to the Panama government’s declaration of deportation plans as well as heavy rains as the reasons for the drop-off in migration numbers. The early data comes as good news for Mulino, who was elected earlier this year on a pledge to reduce illegal immigration through Panama and immediately set out on a plan to counter the migration. Mulino won Panama’s presidential election in May, beating his closest rival by nearly 10 percentage points, riding a wave of voter discontent over the nation’s sluggish economic growth and an endorsement from the still-popular former president. The 65-year-old lawyer also campaigned on a pledge to crack down on illegal immigration through the Darien Gap. The Darien Gap, a vast jungle region that stretches between Colombia and southern Panama, has proven to be a paramount transit area for illegal migrants headed for the U.S.-Mexico border. Over half a million migrants crossed the Darien Gap on their northward journey to the U.S. in 2023, according to the Council on Foreign Relations. Over 212,000 migrants entered Panama after crossing through the Darien Gap so far this year, according to the AP. The vast majority are Venezuelan nationals, while other foreign nationals include Colombians, Ecuadorians, and Chinese. “The border of the United States, instead of being in Texas, moved to Panama,” then-candidate Mulino said on the campaign trail. “We’re going to close the Darien and we’re going to repatriate all these people.” Mulino’s position on illegal immigration marks a major shift from the previous administration in Panama, which largely sought to assist migrants’ journey to the Costa Rican border in lieu of blocking them and returning them to their home countries. On July 1, the day Mulino was sworn in, his government signed a deal with the Biden administration aiming to control the level of migration. The memorandum of understanding between the two governments calls for a deployment of American screening officers to assist Panamanian officials in deporting migrants crossing the Darien Gap, according to the plan. U.S. Department of Homeland Security officials with asylum-screening experience will be deployed to Panama to help its government process migrants, and the U.S. will provide funds to beef up Panama’s deportation capabilities. Although migration through the Darien Gap remains close to what was witnessed last year, U.S. officials have yet to fully implement their bilateral agreement, leaving room for more progress. Efforts to control the migration routes running through the Darien Gap would have a major impact on U.S. immigration enforcement officials, who continue to deal with an ongoing border crisis. More than 7 million migrants have crossed the U.S.-Mexico border illegally since President Joe Biden entered office in January 2021, according to the latest data from U.S. Customs and Border Protection. Originally published by the Daily Caller News Foundation The post New Central American President Follows Through on Pledge to Cut Illegal Immigration to US appeared first on The Daily Signal.

We present you funny dog posts from Jul 14 to Jul 20 that will paws-itively make you through the rest of the week!

Manchin Reminds Everyone: No Avoiding an Open Convention Now