Robert Duvall obits tomorrow, in keeping with the official policy of this blog. This will give some time for the errors and omissions to shake out.
Yes, I know.
February 16th, 2026Firings watch.
February 16th, 2026Jerome Tang out as head coach of the Kansas State men’s basketball team.
Even better, the firing is “for cause”, which means they don’t have to pay his $18.7 million buyout.
It seems like the precipitating incident is a rant Tang went on last week:
…
Tang was 71-57 in “nearly four seasons” as coach.
Obit watch: February 12, 2026.
February 12th, 2026Bud Cort, actor. THR. Other credits include “Midnight Caller”, “The Chocolate War”, and “Sledge Hammer!”.
Lory Patrick, actress. She doesn’t have that long a list of credits, but this is interesting:
She later married Dean Jones, and they stayed married for 42 years (until Mr. Jones died).
Andrew Ranken, drummer for The Pogues.
Among other contributions, the Pogues credited him with coming up with the title “Rum, Sodomy and the Lash,” based on a quotation attributed to Winston Churchill: “Don’t talk to me about naval tradition. It’s nothing but rum, sodomy and the lash.”
“It seemed to sum up life in our band,” Mr. Ranken once said.
Fred Smith, musician. Interesting story: he started out with Blondie, and then defected to Television. After he left, Blondie blew up into a huge success, while Television broke up after two albums.
James Van Der Beek. NYT (archived). Other credits include “CSI: Cyber”, “Law and Order: SVU”, “Law and Order: Criminal Intent”, and “Walker” (not “Walker, Texas Ranger”, but the reboot).
Obit watch: February 11, 2026.
February 11th, 2026I had not previously heard of Hudson Talbott, but I find his obituary touching.
He wrote children’s books.
Mr. Talbott’s collaboration on “Into the Woods,” published in 1988, was a happier experience. The musical, which opened on Broadway a year earlier, is for adults — although it is based in part on folk tales by the Brothers Grimm, and features characters like Cinderella that are familiar to children. Mr. Talbott adapted it for a younger audience.
James Lapine, the musical’s Tony Award-winning librettist, said in an email that the book “honors our show rather than reinvents it.”
Mr. Talbott used a lush visual style, which he described as “more or less 18th-century French,” for illustrations like the depiction of Little Red Riding Hood’s grandmother inside the wolf’s open mouth, and he rewrote the story with help from Mr. Sondheim’s notes.
“Both Steve and I loved what he did,” Mr. Lapine said. “And the book remains my favorite gift to anyone who has a child.”
…
As a child, he showed artistic talent, but he had difficulty reading; he discovered later in life that he had dyslexia. In his semi-autobiographical book “A Walk in the Words” (2021), he wrote that drawing allowed him to disappear into a safe world all his own.
“I was the slowest reader in my class,” he wrote. “When everybody was turning to the next page, I was still on the first sentence. Nobody knew. But the books knew! And they were coming for me!”
…
Nancy Paulsen, the president and publisher of an imprint at Penguin Young Readers, who edited over a dozen of Mr. Talbott’s books, said that he was more confident in his artwork than in his writing. In painting, he employed various styles and was inspired by work from the Renaissance and the Hudson River School.
“He was very sophisticated about what he showed kids, but it was very easy to understand,” Ms. Paulsen said in an interview. “In ‘A Walk in the Words,’ when you see the wall of words, a kid knows what he’s doing there.”
In one part of the book, the boy cowers before the wall of words; in another, he tears down a wall of shame.
…
In 2022, Mr. Talbott spoke by Zoom to dyslexic students at a school in Richmond, Va., telling them that, as a child, he had dealt with his own challenges by spending too much time alone — “and nobody was there to help me, and it wasn’t their fault because I was hiding it.”
“If I could go back in time,” he added, “I would try to say to me, as a little boy, ‘Don’t be ashamed. There’s nothing to be ashamed of. You are who you are, and you read the way you read.’”
Relevant to my interests.
February 11th, 2026I have my share of issues with The Firearm Blog. But one thing they’ve been doing that I do like is “Small Business Spotlight”. Yesterday’s entry pushed my buttons:
As everyone knows, Bob, I already have my own official trainer. But Rick Barrett looks interesting as heck, and it seems like he’s up near Waco, which isn’t too far for me. I think I’d like to spend some time hanging out and talking with him.
And there’s a lot of good resources on his site about how Catholic social teaching interacts with the idea of self-defense. I think this site is worth a bookmark.
Going fishing.
February 7th, 2026I started the post months ago, but couldn’t do anything with it before now because of image uploading issues and Bluehost’s refusal to assist with those.
Bluehost upgraded my WordPress instance for this blog a few days ago, and image uploading seems to be working slightly better, so I think I can post this now and see what happens.
My intent when I started this was to dangle some stinky old bait in the water to see if a specific person took the bait.
Jump goes here.
Gun news.
February 6th, 2026I think this is big news, but I’m having trouble finding any coverage of it outside of one news story, and a linked article in that story.
Big Rock Sports, LLC has filed for bankruptcy.
Big Rock is a major distributor of firearms and other outdoor gear. And the bankruptcy filing is a Chapter 7 – total liquidation – not a more common Chapter 11 reorganization.
According to the articles, Big Rock has over $100 million in outstanding liabilities, and assets “between $10 million and $50 million”.
I registered for a PACER account in an attempt to find the filing, but they say it takes seven to ten days after registration to activate my search privileges. Plus I’ll have to pay a fee to get a copy of the filing once I can search for it. If I am able to find it somewhere, I’ll link it here.
The SGB article lists some of the creditors. I don’t see any of the major gun companies listed there, but the stories don’t provide a complete list of creditors.
Interesting fact: Big Rock had a Canadian subsidiary. “Had” is the operative word, as that was liquidated in December of 2025.
Obit watch: February 4, 2026.
February 4th, 2026Chuck Negron, of Three Dog Night.
…
The band splintered in 1976, and Mr. Negron sank further into the abyss, in large part because of heroin addiction. His millions in savings vanished and, before long, he was living in a Skid Row drug den in Los Angeles. The police often raided crack dealer neighbors but “never bothered us,” he recalled in a 1998 interview with The Las Vegas Sun. “That’s how pathetic we were.”
He hit a particular low one day when he was zonked out on a curb and noticed people gawking. “It’s really embarrassing,” he remembered telling a companion next to him, “these people want an autograph.”
“Chuck, you just peed in the street,” the friend responded. “They don’t know who you are.”
…
Virginia Oliver. I’m not exactly sure she qualifies as “notable”, outside of a small circle. But the obit is fun, she led a good life, and it lets me use a tag I don’t get to use as often as I’d like.
On the frigid and crustacean-filled waters of Penobscot Bay, Mrs. Oliver was known as the Lobster Lady. She was a folk hero to Mainers — an enduring, if fading, emblem of the state’s hardy, matter-of-fact work ethic.
“She represented that no-nonsense Mainer who just got up every day and did what they had to do,” Barbara A. Walsh, the author of a children’s book about Mrs. Oliver, said in an interview. “It’s grit and determination.”
During lobster season — from June to December — Mrs. Oliver would wake up at 2:45 a.m., put on overalls and drive her four-wheel-drive pickup truck to the dock. After loading her boat, the Virginia, with bait and gas, she would head to sea before sunrise, hauling lobster pots until lunchtime.
…
Mrs. Oliver fished for more than 60 years with her husband, Maxwell Oliver Sr., known as Bill. After he died in 2006, Max Jr. took his spot. “I’m the boss,” she would occasionally remind both of them.
As a general rule, her authority was not to be questioned on land or at sea.
“She was a hard worker, a lovely lady, but you definitely didn’t mess around with her,” Dave Cousens, a lobsterman who knew Mrs. Oliver for several decades, said in an interview. “She had a mouth like a sailor. A lot of things she said you couldn’t print in a newspaper.”
…
A few years back, she needed stitches after a particularly obstreperous lobster sliced her finger.
“What are you out there lobstering for?” the doctor asked.
“Because I want to,” she replied.
She was 103 when a fall forced her to give up lobstering. She was 105 when she passed away.
Mickey Lolich, of the Detroit Tigers.
…
The Tigers finished 12 games ahead of the Baltimore Orioles as they won the 1968 American League pennant, led by the right-hander Denny McLain, who won 31 games and lost only 6 that season in becoming the first pitcher to reach the 30-game milestone in 34 years, a feat that hasn’t been matched since. Lolich, meanwhile, compiled a laudable 17-9 record.
McClain was bested by the future Hall of Famer Bob Gibson in the World Series opener, at Busch Stadium in St. Louis. Despite battling a groin infection that had developed overnight, Lolich pitched the Tigers to an 8-1 victory in Game 2 and hit the only home run of his career, a drive down the left-field line off the Cardinal starter, Nelson Briles.
The Tigers lost the next two games at home and were facing elimination when Lolich took the mound again, once more against Briles, but this time at Tiger Stadium. Lolich yielded three runs in the first inning, but the Tigers managed to rally for a 5-3 victory.
They won again in Game 6, in St. Louis, behind solid pitching by McLain and a 10-run third inning.
The durable Lolich was called on again for Game 7, when he faced Gibson.
With the game scoreless in the seventh inning, the Tiger outfielder Jim Northrup connected on a liner over the head of Curt Flood, the Cardinals’ center fielder, for a two-run, two-out triple. Detroit went on to a 4-1 victory, giving the Tigers their first World Series championship since they defeated the Chicago Cubs in seven games in 1945.
…
Obit watch: January 31, 2026.
January 31st, 2026Catherine O’Hara. NYT (share link).
Other credits include “A Mighty Wind”, voice work in “Where the Wild Things Are”, and “The Greatest Event in Television History”.
Demond Wilson. Other credits include “Today’s F.B.I.”, “Dealing: Or The Berkeley-to-Boston Forty-Brick Lost-Bag Blues”, and the original “Mission: Impossible”.
Firings watch.
January 30th, 2026Oh, Minnesota.
Kwesi Adofo-Mensah out as general manager of the Minnesota Vikings.
And Derek Falvey out as president of the Minnesota Twins.
…
Falvey’s departure was framed publicly as a mutual decision to part ways.
Missed this the other day, but Joe Lombardi out as offensive coordinator in Denver.
Wide receivers coach Keary Colbert and cornerbacks coach Addison Lynch also were fired.
Obit watch: January 30, 2026.
January 30th, 2026I’m going to do a round-up from the past couple of days. I’m also going to draw heavily on the NYT since we’re reaching the end of the month, and I have a bunch of share links to burn off before February.
Sly Dunbar, of Sly and Robbie.
…
Mr. Dunbar was known for his precise, propellant and somehow also relaxed drumming. After mastering the one-drop rhythm, a reggae standard that leaves out the kick drum on the first beat of a 4/4 measure, he pioneered the rockers rhythm, which deploys the drum on the first and third beats, and the snare on the second and fourth, making it even more danceable and energetic.
The rockers rhythm challenged the reggae orthodoxy of the 1970s. It fostered new genres like dancehall and made it easier for adjacent styles, like R&B, funk and rock, to incorporate reggae influences.
John L. Allen Jr., prominent Catholic journalist and author. I haven’t read any of his books, but I should probably at least buy the Opus Dei one. (Lawrence likes to give me a hard time about my Opus Dei membership.)
He’s not someone I’d ever heard of, but the obit is mildly interesting, so I’m just going to quote the first paragraph and send you over to the paper of record if it grabs you.
Finally, Dr. Peter H. Duesberg. That name may ring a bell for some people.
He did important early work on cancer.
In the late 1960s, when scientists had little understanding of what caused cancer, Dr. Duesberg studied a virus called Rous sarcoma, which had been associated with malignant tumors in chickens. He published the results of his experiments in 1970, showing that the virus carried a gene, known as Src, that triggered cancer in the birds.
It turned out to be the first known cancer-causing gene, or oncogene.
Dr. Duesberg’s work, at the University of California, Berkeley, set the stage for other researchers who were able to show that normal cells in many animals, including humans, carry a version of this gene, known as a proto-oncogene. Modern cancer treatments are based in part on the understanding that those proto-oncogenes can turn into cancer-spawning oncogenes when damaged over time by carcinogens, radiation or random mutations.
…
But he didn’t pursue his research on oncogenes. Instead, in his work at Berkeley and at the University of Heidelberg in Germany, where he held an appointment starting in 1997, he focused on the more established theory that cancer is caused by damage to the chromosomes, the structures that carry our genetic material.
And in a startling about-face, he inexplicably contradicted his own research, insisting that oncogenes didn’t, in fact, cause cancer; he even went so far as to heckle colleagues at scientific meetings if they supported that idea.
He became more famous as an H.I.V. denialist.
…
…
You’re going down in flames, you tax-fattened hyena! (#157 in a series)
January 29th, 2026Both Bugs and Daffy are wrong. It is forgery season! And what was that about “Forgery is uncommon among the hyenas“?
Sonya Jaquez Lewis was convicted yesterday.
Apparently, Colorado has a crime called “attempting to influence a public servant”? I was under the impression that “attempting to influence a public servant”, especially an elected official, falls under the heading of “democracy”. “Forgery”, on the other hand…
The former senator got crosswise with the state senate’s Ethics Committee last year. She was accused of “mistreating” some of her aides.
She stepped down when the committee announced that Jaquez Lewis had submitted at least one fabricated letter of support, purported to be from a former aide, to the panel. The aide whose name was on the letter told legislative investigators that she didn’t write it and that she had not been in touch with Jaquez Lewis for roughly a year before the missive was sent.
When confronted, Jaquez Lewis told legislative investigators that she was relaying information she had gathered from conversations with the former aide in years past. The letter, however, appeared on letterhead with the aide’s name on it and was written in the first person.
Prosecutors found that Jaquez Lewis had actually written multiple letters purporting to be from former aides.
During a three-day trial this week, Jaquez Lewis admitted to writing the letters of support. But she denied that they were fabrications, saying they were based either on information that was relayed to her previously and, in one instance, that she misattributed a letter to the wrong former aide.
More from the Denver Post:
Yeah, don’t mess with people’s pay.
Her attorney, Craig Lewis Truman, emphasized the stress that Jaquez Lewis felt in the Capitol, compounded by an ethics committee that Jaquez Lewis felt was biased against her.
“Do you think she would put it all on the line for a letter to these kangaroo courts? Or was it because she was under the gun?” Truman said to jurors before their deliberations began.
Just leaving this here:
And keeping with our theme for the day:
And, because Lawrence’s happiness is one of the fifteen to thirty-five most important things to me: the Colorado Sun mentions her party affiliation in the subhead and the second paragraph. The Denver Post waits until the third paragraph.
The state supposedly plans to ask for probation. Hattip to Mike the Musicologist again.
You’re going down in flames, you tax-fattened hyena! (#156 in a series)
January 29th, 2026It has been a minute since we had one of these, but this one is swell. Hattip to Mike the Musicologist on it.
Ayshia “Ajay” Pittman pled guilty to felony charges yesterday, and resigned from the Oklahoma House of Representatives. This moved fairly quickly: as I understand the story, her plea and resignation came just “hours” after she was charged.
She was charged with three felonies: conspiracy to commit a felony, second-degree forgery, and “violation of the Oklahoma Computer Crimes Act”. (Trena Byas, an executive assistant, was also charged. As far as I can tell, she has not taken a plea.)
What exactly did she do? Well, she forged a cashier’s check.
Forgery is uncommon among the hyenas, so this would be noteworthy by itself. But that’s not the best part. She forged a cashier’s check…
…and sent it to the Oklahoma Ethics Commission.
The background for this is that former rep Pittman has a problem with campaign funds. Specifically, she has a problem with diverting campaign funds for personal use.
The Ethics Commission wanted to see proof she was making payments.
…
…
Ms. Pittman agreed to a seven year probated sentence, with deferred adjudication. So if she keeps out of trouble, the charges won’t go on her record.
Her resignation was part of her plea deal.
While on probation, she cannot seek state office, cannot work in state government and cannot work for a government contractor. She must make restitution for misuse of campaign funds, with the money going to charity.
Under a separate settlement with the Ethics Commission, she agreed not to run for any state office, city office, county office, school board office “or any other elected position” in Oklahoma for 15 years.
…
Obit watch: January 27, 2026.
January 27th, 2026Thomas Fogarty, another one of those big damn heroes of medicine.
Dr. Fogarty invented the Fogarty catheter.
“When people had a blood clot in their arm or leg, they usually ended up having three operations,” he told Stanford Medicine magazine in 2006. “Fifty percent of the patients died. I thought there must be a better way.”
Dr. Fogarty, who died at 91 on Dec. 28 in Los Altos, Calif., found a solution while a student at the University of Cincinnati College of Medicine, from which he graduated in 1960. There, he conceived a device that would revolutionize vascular surgery — a balloon catheter that removed blood clots from patients’ limbs through a minimally invasive technique that became an industry standard.
…
For the first balloon-catheter procedure — in 1960 or 1961, according to various accounts — Dr. John J. Cranley, a vascular surgeon who was Dr. Fogarty’s mentor, first made a small incision in an occluded artery in a patient’s leg. He inserted the catheter — with the balloon deflated — past the blood clot. The balloon was then inflated with saline solution and retracted, pulling the clot along with it.
His response was, “Holy Cow!,” Dr. Fogarty told the publication Endovascular Today in 2004. Dr. Cranley exclaimed, “Wow, this really works!
…
…
In a video tribute on his 90th birthday in 2024, colleagues at Fogarty Innovation described him as unconventional, stubborn and “about as touchy-feely as a steel screw.” Colleagues also paraphrased the mantra that drove Dr. Fogarty’s career: “How can I make this better? How can I reduce pain? How can I get the patient out of the hospital more quickly?”
At the same time, Andrew Cleeland, the organization’s chief executive, said in an interview that Dr. Fogarty had been a prankster who didn’t always take himself so seriously. Thomas Fogarty Jr. added that his father “wouldn’t tolerate foolishness except foolishness of the highest quality; well into his 80s, nothing was funnier to him than a whoopee cushion.”
He was also a fly fisherman.
Obit watch: January 23, 2026.
January 23rd, 2026James Bernard, “founding editor and star writer” of the hip-hop magazine “The Source”.
His sister, Emily Bernard, who confirmed the death, said he died by suicide. His body was discovered on Dec. 29 in a wooded area in Pemberton Township, N.J., near his home.
Mr. Bernard is believed to have died around the time he was reported missing, in March 2024. He would have turned 60 last August.
…
His career at The Source unraveled in 1994, when he and other staff members organized a walkout after Mr. Mays published a laudatory article about the little-known group Almighty RSO, with which he was close, without consulting other editors. When calls for Mr. Mays’s resignation went nowhere, Mr. Bernard and others left the magazine.
In 1997, he and Mr. Dennis started a rival magazine, XXL. The founders conceived the quarterly as both a hip-hop tastemaker and a broader lifestyle magazine, like Playboy in its 1960s and ’70s heyday.
The Wikipedia entry on ‘The Source” goes into more detail about this and other issues.