We got out for the sunrise when it was 18 below 0 with a "feels like" of 35 below.

7:09:

7:29:

I hope you're keeping warm... at least most of the time. I recommend getting out and challenging yourself to feel the cold. It's thrilling.

But watch out for exploding trees!

"New York City Could Get a Foot of Snow. Mamdani Knows It’s a Test."

The NYT puts its finger on why this foot of snow is such a big deal. It's hitting political hot spots.

Subheadline: "Plenty of New York City mayors have faced blowback over their handling of blizzards. In several appearances this week, Mayor Zohran Mamdani has sought to show he is prepared."

I guess his opponents are hoping for a snow nightmare.

As for Mamdani, he's getting out in front of Snowmageddon and endeavoring to seem lovable:

Stay warm, stay safe New York. pic.twitter.com/aFbDsOkzLn

— Mayor Zohran Kwame Mamdani (@NYCMayor) January 18, 2026

What, really, does Donald Trump have to do with Thomas Mann's "Magic Mountain"?

I'm prepared for this. I read "The Magic Mountain"... 50 years ago. And right now I'm reading "It’s Time to Talk About Donald Trump’s Logorrhea/How many polite ways are there to ask whether the President of the United States is losing it?" by Susan B. Glasser, in The New Yorker). '

So let's see:

[I]n rambling on so much, Trump reveals just about everything one could ever want to know about him—his lack of discipline, his ignorance, his vanity, insecurity, and crudeness, and a mean streak that knows no limits. “It is remarkable how a man cannot summarize his thoughts in even the most general sort of way without betraying himself completely,” Thomas Mann wrote a century ago, in his novel “The Magic Mountain,” set in a sanitarium perched above the Swiss mountain town of Davos, where Trump spent the better part of this week proving to the stunned attendees of the annual World Economic Forum the continuing relevance of Mann’s observation....

[W]hen Trump reached the fulsome self-praise section of his speech, he explained that he was such an incredible peacemaker that he had even managed to end wars in places where he had not known they were happening. Imagine admitting this about yourself. Another quote from “The Magic Mountain” sprang to mind: “I know I am talking nonsense, but I’d rather go rambling on. . . .”

1. It's not rambling. It's the weave. There's no acknowledgement that Trump himself has explained what he is doing. He calls it the weave. He's in control of it. You just don't like the elaborate tangles of verbiage. 

2. And yet you push "The Magic Mountain" at me! Why isn't Trump terse and to the point? Why isn't Thomas Mann!!!?

3. You don't want to follow the complex feats of language that require you to keep track of numerous threads to visualize the luminous tapestry.

4. Many a reader has gotten fed up with "The Magic Mountain," and she knows it, but I doubt that Susan B. Glasser would regard Thomas Mann as some kind of nut. I picture her denouncing the reader for not digging in, paying attention, trusting the author, and taking the time to understand. 

5. It's not as though Glasser drew upon deep literary experience to come up with material from "The Magic Mountain." It's the famous book set in the location where Trump spoke. To quote it is like quoting your last fortune cookie or scrap of litter right at your feet.

6. What does Glasser really know of "The Magic Mountain"? She's got 2 quotes, and if you go to Goodreads, you'll find both quotes within the top 6 quotes from the book. They are #5 and #6.

7. ##1-4: "Tolerance becomes a crime when applied to evil"/"It is love, not reason, that is stronger than death"/"Laughter is a sunbeam of the soul"/"There are so many different kinds of stupidity, and cleverness is one of the worst." I'm tempted to ask Grok to write a pro-Trump essay using those 4 quotes.

"At a mushroom hot pot restaurant there, the server set a timer for 15 minutes and warned us, 'Don't eat it until the timer goes off or you might see little people."

"It seems like very common knowledge in the culture there."

The quote is from Colin Domnauer, "a doctoral candidate in biology at the University of Utah and the Natural History Museum of Utah, who is studying L. asiatica," quoted in "'They saw them on their dishes when eating': The mushroom making people hallucinate dozens of tiny humans" (BBC).

Every year, doctors at a hospital in the Yunnan Province of China brace themselves for an influx of people with an unusual complaint. The patients come with a strikingly odd symptom: visions of pint-sized, elf-like figures – marching under doors, crawling up walls and clinging to furniture.... 

In a 1991 paper, two researchers from the Chinese Academy of Sciences described cases of people in Yunnan Province who had eaten a certain mushroom and experienced "lilliputian hallucinations" – the psychiatric term for the perception of tiny human, animal or fantasy figures....

[O]ther known psychedelic compounds also usually produce idiosyncratic trips that vary not only from person to person but also from one experience to the next within the same individual. With L. asiatica, though, "the perception of little people is very reliably and repeatedly reported", Domnauer says. "I don't know of anything else that produces such consistent hallucinations."

Do rats see little rats? 

Are there other substances that produce such specific hallucinations?

Brisk.

Sunrise — 7:04, 7:11, 7:13, 7:28.

Write about whatever you want in the comments.

"I mean, heck, Donald Trump tried to steal the election, the last election."

BREAKING: Newsom at Davos: "There's no rule of law. It's the rule of Don... I mean, heck, Donald Trump tried to steal the election, the last election. Tried to light democracy on fire, and then pardoned everyone that participated in that."

He just hit the nail in the head here.… pic.twitter.com/ETAqF9SjX4

— Brian Krassenstein (@krassenstein) January 22, 2026

"When tourists go on vacation, the area around them becomes a liminal space. Their geographic location is no longer real..."

"... but a fantasy that they are living in. If tourists have the fantasy disrupted, they can get really mean. And that is why this raccoon biologist has to conduct her research wearing a bikini."

A discussion at Metafilter.

The Oscar nominations are out.

Here.

I don't think I've ever been less interested in the nominations. I haven't seen or been interested in seeing any of these movies. 

It's happening!

@PatMcAfeeShow it’s happening… pic.twitter.com/4GbBspkFlU

— Bob Rae (@TheBobRae) January 22, 2026

"The swan, who had recently lost his mate, would not move away from a vending machine at Tri-Township Park in Troy, Ill."

"The swan stared at his reflection below the Dr Pepper dispensers, thinking it showed his mate, park officials said. The swan needed a new partner, but the parks department would not be able to budget for new swans until April, said Sandy Pensoneau, the office manager at the Tri-Township Park District.... Park regulars had been clamoring for a response, Ms. Pensoneau said. 'The people that walk the park every day, they’re like, "Hey, you guys need to do something. This is sad,"' she said...."

From "Swan Seeks Mate: Must Like Cold Lake and Small Flock/An Illinois parks department sought help from the community to find mates for two swans after they lost their companions. Residents responded" (NYT).

"And this is for the people of Gaza. We've developed it into zones. In the beginning, we were toying with the idea of saying, let's build a free zone and then we have a Hamas zone."

"And then we said, you know what, let's just plan for catastrophic success. Hamas signed a deal to demilitarize — that is what we are going to enforce. Rafah we'll start with. This will show a lot of workforce housing. We think this could be done in two-three years. We've already started removing the rubble and doing some of the demolition. And then new Gaza. It could be a hope. It could be a destination. Have a lot of industry from the private sector. There'll be amazing investment opportunities. I know it's a little risky to be investing in a place like this, but we need you to come, take faith, invest in the people, try to be a part of it."

Acclimated.

Sunrise — 7:28, 7:46.

Talk about whatever you want in the comments.

"Barron Trump was on a video call with a woman in London when he saw her ex-boyfriend allegedly grab her hair and push her to the floor while shouting 'you are not worth anything'..."

"Snaresbrook crown court was told. Trump phoned the police immediately after he believed he had seen Matvei Rumiantsev, a Russian citizen, repeatedly punch the woman. In court, a dramatic call was played in which Trump’s son can be heard calling 999 operators and telling them: 'I just got a call from a girl I know. She’s getting beaten up.'... Trump, 19, was heard pleading... 'It’s really an emergency, please. I got a call from her with a guy beating her up.' The 999 operator then told off Trump for refusing to answer questions, saying: 'Can you stop being rude and actually answer my questions. If you want to help the person, you’ll answer my questions clearly and precisely, thank you. So how do you know her?' Trump replied: 'I met her on social media. She’s getting really badly beat up and the call was about eight minutes ago, I don’t know what could have happened by now.' He added: 'So sorry for being rude.'"

From "Barron Trump ‘saved woman’s life’ in London/The US president’s youngest son tells court that he saw his friend being assaulted by a former boyfriend during a video call and called the police" (London Times).

Barron made that emergency call on January 18, 2025. The trial is going on now.

"After a Thursday board meeting in New York City, Mr. Klempf, 34, flew to Athens for eight hours, where he toured the Parthenon."

"He then hopped on a flight to Egypt, saw the pyramids, rode a camel and visited the Grand Egyptian Museum, all before returning to San Francisco in time for Sunday dinner.... Mr. Klempf is among the growing number of travelers, short on vacation time or looking to save money, who are embarking on whirlwind itineraries that take advantage of time zones and credit card points to string together one- to three-day trips."

That's the travel trend called "microvacations," from "Travel Trends in 2026: Uncertainty, Face Scans and ‘Microvacations'" (NYT).

How awful!

I can see taking trips that are only 2 or 3 days, but not with all that time on a plane. Go somewhere nearer! But it seems people want "bucket list" credit, and there's nothing more bucket-list-y than the Parthenon and the pyramids.