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Ted Roche

@tedroche.contoocook.org
953 followers 482 following 1K posts

He/him. Central NH weather observer: CWOP/CoCoRaHS/SKYWARN® StormSpotter: 🌄 ⛈ 🌡 ⛅ 🌪 🌀 ⇇ #ETTD, duh; 1st was dumb, 2nd unforgivable. Слава Україні! Mundus sine Cæsaribus.

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Ted Roche @tedroche.contoocook.org · 03/10/2026
From his final Presidential campaign, a button ringed in blue and concentric red circles, in blue "President Nixon" and red: "Now more than ever." The double meaning reeked of sarcasm to this teenager.
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Ted Roche @tedroche.contoocook.org · 03/10/2026
Campaign button with Richard Milhous Nixon's black-and-white photograph in the middle, a red banner above, "NIXON'S" and the a blue banner below, "THE ONE!"
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Ted Roche @tedroche.contoocook.org · 30/09/2026
"I say, I say, y'all been caught, red-handed, ChickenHawk."
Checkhawk Henery Hawk dragging Foghorn Leghorn by the tail feathers across the barnyard.
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Ted Roche @tedroche.contoocook.org · 25/09/2026
Mornings in the 30's are kicking off the leap-peeping season in NH's capitol area. Plan your peak peeper tours with explorefall.com #wxNH
Fall Foliage conditions over a map of New Hampshire: Orange (medium_ in the top quarter from the White Mountains north, Yellow (low) for most of the state and Green (None) in the southeast corner covering the seacoast to Nashua, Manchester  and Concord.
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Ted Roche @tedroche.contoocook.org · 23/09/2026
A Windows BSOD ("Blue Screen of Death") reporting a failure of Windows to do its job.
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Ted Roche @tedroche.contoocook.org · 16/09/2026
If only someone had warned us!
Sign below a preserved brain in a jar: "DO NOT USE THIS BRAIN! -ABNORMAL -" from the classic comedy "Young Frankenstein" (1974)
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Ted Roche @tedroche.contoocook.org · 10/09/2026
One of our two movies for Labor Day, along with "9 to 5" 😢
Scene from "Office Space" (1999) where the three main collaborators destroy a PC with a baseball bat.  https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0151804/ Highly recommended if you have not watched, surprisingly not all that dated for a movie from the 1900's.
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Ted Roche @tedroche.contoocook.org · 08/09/2026
Fact Check: ✔️True
Excerpt from transcript at the link above: 
INSKEEP: (Laughter) I'm glad you mentioned AI because I've been thinking about another aspect of this. The president is using more and more AI in his posts on social media. His output, if that's the word, over the weekend included seven posts, I believe, about renaming New Mexico New America, including an AI-generated post that showed him pasting the word America on a New Mexico sign. What do Republicans think of the president's focus, his emphasis on matters like that, rather than - I don't know - the cost of groceries?

GOLDBERG: Yeah. Look, I mean, he's been on - this weekend, he was on - he was posting on Truth Social like an escaped monkey from a cocaine study.

INSKEEP: (Laughter).
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Ted Roche @tedroche.contoocook.org · 07/09/2026
Not an EM, just a weather nerd and an IT graphing nerd, too. I don't know if it's feasible for all plots, but it would be easier to read if the table rows were in the same order top-to-bottom as the stacked columns. Also, blanking the '0.0' entries shows seasonality clearly. Interesting data!
Graph of the average number of types of weather events from Gray, Maine Weather Forecast Office by month, with a table of data below with the exact numbers. Generated from the link: https://mesonet.agron.iastate.edu/plotting/auto/?_wait=no&q=263&which=WY&opt=wfo&how=per_eventid&station=GYX&state=NH&fema=1&_ugc_state=NH&ugc=NHC001&_ugc2_state=IA&ugc2=IAZ048&_ugc3_state=IA&ugc3=IAZ048&_r=t&dpi=100&_fmt=png
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Ted Roche @tedroche.contoocook.org · 06/09/2026
The Best is Yet To Come!
Kimberly Guilfoyle at the RNC convention declaring "The Best is Yet to Come!"
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Ted Roche @tedroche.contoocook.org · 06/09/2026
Captain America saying "I Understood That Reference"
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Ted Roche @tedroche.contoocook.org · 27/08/2026
"In honor of those who served Co[mpany] M, N.H. State Guard, during THE World War."
Bronze plaque, with blue patina from age, stating: "In honor of those who served Co[mpany] M, NH State Guard, during THE World War." -- in all caps, capitalization added for emphasis and proper names. Located in White Park, Concord, NH, https://www.concordnh.gov/Facilities/Facility/Details/White-Park-21
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Ted Roche @tedroche.contoocook.org · 20/08/2026
Strategic future thinking ...
Picture of Albert Einstein with quotation (of questionable veracity) "I do not know what weapons the third world war will be fought with, but I know that the fourth one will be fought with sticks and stones"
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Ted Roche @tedroche.contoocook.org · 16/08/2026
This seems like a great opportunity for @pbsnews.org to call in some experts on Rx and economics and speculate on what a premature end to the $9.8 BILLION subsidy program MIGHT do to costs & coverage. Or, "just wait and see!" ¯\_ (ツ)_/¯
Screenshot exerpt from part of the article, with "Q:" and "A:" added for clarity: 
Q: Will there be Medicare Part D coverage changes?
A: Right now, it's impossible to know, Cubanski said. That information will only be available on Oct. 1, when plan sponsors can start to market their offerings.

Q: What will happen to my Medicare Part D premiums, out-of-pocket maximums or cost-sharing?
A: This is another wait-and-see question.

People's premiums were about $26 lower in 2025 and about $16 lower this year on average than they would have been without the subsidy, according to a federal government report.

It's not clear how much people's premiums will increase next year, if at all. CMS said it would release more key information in September.
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Ted Roche @tedroche.contoocook.org · 07/08/2026
Or... is the AI getting smart enough to cover its tracks, intercept the log entries, disguise the packets,... clever girl!
From "Jurassic Park," (1993) the hunter realizes he's the prey, "Clever girl" says Muldoon (Bob Peck, 1945-1999)
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Ted Roche @tedroche.contoocook.org · 05/08/2026
Profit: www.macrotrends.net/stocks/chart...
Table from linked site, showing CoreCivic Annual Gross Profit in Millions of USD: 2025: $519, 2024: $468, 2023: $434, 2022: $432, 2021: $526, 2020: $499
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Ted Roche @tedroche.contoocook.org · 03/08/2026
And the weather doesn't stop neatly at the state line, as it sometimes does. Check your local weather forecast office (in this case, weather.gov/box) for details #wxMa #wxRI #wxCT #wxNH
Flash  flood warnings on the front page of Boston's weather.gov/box
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Ted Roche @tedroche.contoocook.org · 03/08/2026
This weather passed over us an hour ago and overwhelmed storm drainage and left standing water in fields and low buildings. FLASH FLOOD WARNING - Concord/Merrimack - Hillsborough - Nashua - Portsmouth Seacoast - Rockingham - Strafford #wxNH
Map of southeastern NH with a red overlay showing the flash flood warning area. See text and alt text of accompanying screen for details.Text of flash flood warning: Flash Flood Warning  FLASH FLOOD WARNING   Flash Flood Warning
HILLSBOROUGH
Areas Affected:
Hillsborough, NH - Merrimack, NH - Rockingham, NH - Strafford, NH
Effective: Mon, 8/3 7:55am	Updated: Mon, 8/3 8:30am	Urgency: Immediate
Expires: Mon, 8/3 11:15am	Severity:  Severe 	Certainty: Likely
 
Details:
At 755 AM EDT, Doppler radar indicated thunderstorms producing heavy rain across the warned area. Between 1 and 2.5 inches of rain have fallen. The expected rainfall rate is 1 to 3 inches in 1 hour. Flash flooding is ongoing or expected to begin shortly. HAZARD...Life threatening flash flooding. The heaviest rainfall is expected in southeastern Hillsborough County and southeastern Rockingham County. Urban flash flooding is expected. SOURCE...Radar. IMPACT...Life threatening flash flooding of creeks and streams, urban areas, highways, streets and underpasses. Some locations that will experience flash flooding include... Manchester, Nashua, Derry, Merrimack, Durham, Exeter, Salem, Northwood and Bedford. This includes the following highways... Interstate 93 between mile markers 1 and 31. Interstate 293 between mile markers 1 and 11.
Information:
Turn around, don't drown when encountering flooded roads. Most flood deaths occur in vehicles. Be aware of your surroundings and do not drive on flooded roads.
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Ted Roche @tedroche.contoocook.org · 28/07/2026
Every industry seems to think that AI is good enough for some other application, but not for their work. What if they are all correct? It's bad enough when lawyers think AI will help them. This came from within the courtroom staff. From @404media.co www.404media.co/judge-caught...
Screenshot of two paragraphs from the article: "In a memorandum decision concerning a case about a man who sold drugs to another man who overdosed and died, filed on July 23, Judge Paul Felix wrote in a footnote of the decision that a transcript contained errors that looked a lot like generative AI. The footnote was spotted by attorney Rob Freund on X.

“At one point in the transcript, a motion, presumably made by the State, is attributed to the trial court. At another point, an objection, presumably made by Williams, is attributed to the Bailiff. At yet another point, the State’s closing argument is attributed to the trial court,” judge Felix wrote. “These errors, among others not described herein, complicated but did not substantially impede our review of Williams’s appeal. Regardless, we remind the Court Reporter that this court relies on transcripts being true and accurate representations of the transcribed proceedings. Based upon the types of errors reviewed, it appears that generative artificial intelligence may have assisted with the preparation of this transcript. While AI can improve efficiency and be a productive tool for many professionals, it is incumbent upon those using such systems to proofread and ensure the accuracy of the generated product.”
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Ted Roche @tedroche.contoocook.org · 26/07/2026
Joe Biden, in a sharp suit, standing in front of a microphone and pointing to the left and up, captioned, "I DID THAT"
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Ted Roche @tedroche.contoocook.org · 22/07/2026
If only if someone had warned us!
An original rendering of the camera lens of HAL 9000, from Stanley Kubrick's classic "2001" based on the book by Arthur C. Clarke. Created by Tom Cowap, CC BY-SA 4.0 <https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0>, via Wikimedia Commons
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Ted Roche @tedroche.contoocook.org · 22/07/2026
So, while training a human-eating tiger to eat a target, the tiger found a flaw in its cage, ate through the cage, the trainer and then ate the target, wreaking havoc along the way? Perhaps we need to rethink this. I don't think instructing the tiger to behave is the best policy.
Screenshot of a portion of the report, two paragraphs state:

"While operating in our sandboxed testing environment, our models spent a substantial amount of inference compute finding a way to obtain open Internet access, in pursuit of solving the evaluation problem. To gain access, the models identified and exploited a zero-day vulnerability (which we’ve now responsibly disclosed to the vendor) in the package registry cache proxy. With this access, our models performed a series of privilege escalation and lateral movement actions in our research testing environment until the models reached a node with Internet access."

"After gaining Internet access, the models inferred that Hugging Face potentially hosted models, datasets and solutions for ExploitGym. Knowing this, the model searched for and successfully found ways to gain access to secret information that it could use to cheat the evaluation. In one example, the model chained together multiple attack vectors, including using stolen credentials and zero-day vulnerabilities to find a remote code execution path on the Hugging Face servers. OpenAI’s security team discovered this anomalous activity internally."
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Ted Roche @tedroche.contoocook.org · 12/07/2026
"Look on my works, ye Mighty, and despair!"
Text of "Ozymandias," 1819 version, by Percy Shelley, a screenshot of the page from https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ozymandias#Text. Text: 
I met a traveller from an antique land
Who said: Two vast and trunkless legs of stone
Stand in the desart. Near them, on the sand,
Half sunk, a shattered visage lies, whose frown,
And wrinkled lip, and sneer of cold command,
Tell that its sculptor well those passions read
Which yet survive, stamped on these lifeless things,
The hand that mocked them and the heart that fed:
And on the pedestal these words appear:
"My name is Ozymandias, king of kings:
Look on my works, ye Mighty, and despair!"
Nothing beside remains. Round the decay
Of that colossal wreck, boundless and bare
The lone and level sands stretch far away."
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Ted Roche @tedroche.contoocook.org · 11/07/2026
From the Project 2025 handbook, page 532: archive.org/details/proj... 2025
Screenshot from the link in the post, "National Monument Designations. As has every Democratic President before him beginning with Jimmy Carter, Joe Biden has abused his authority under the Antiquities Act of 1906. Like the outrageous, unilateral withdrawals from public use of multiple use federal land under the Carter, Clinton, and Obama Administrations, Biden’s first national monument was one in Colorado—adopted over the objections of scores of local groups and at least one American Indian tribe.” In the days before the 2024 election, Biden will likely designate more western monuments."
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Ted Roche @tedroche.contoocook.org · 04/07/2026
This machine kills fascists.
Photograph of Woodie Guthrie and his guitar. Painted on the guitar body is "THIS MACHINE KILLS FASCISTS"
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Ted Roche @tedroche.contoocook.org · 28/06/2026
This week seems to be a good time to point out that NWS has an experimental page describing "Heat Risk" that's worth reviewing; feedback encouraged: www.wpc.ncep.noaa.gov/heatrisk/
Screenshot of https://www.wpc.ncep.noaa.gov/heatrisk/ showing predicted heat risk for Thursday, July 2nd, with the entire US at some risk: West coast to the Rockies rated "Minor" Central, East Coast and Southern US as "Major" and all of Michigan down through the western Appalachians  and Ohio Valley as "EXTREME." Be prepared.
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Ted Roche @tedroche.contoocook.org · 26/06/2026
Journalists and aspiring journalists, note: how to write a lede!
Screenshot of the 2nd and 3rd paragraph of the linked article: 

https://www.npr.org/2026/06/26/nx-s1-5867415/resistance-rangers-trump-history?unified=true

[ Kerwin, who used to be the exhibit planner at West Virginia's Harpers Ferry National Historic Park, had spent years building a wall of remembrance to highlight hundreds of enslaved people with ties to this historic site — a place best known for a violent raid that attempted to incite an uprising and end American slavery.

Instead, the old stone building that was set to house Kerwin's exhibit has sat empty. The door, locked. Its windows boarded up. The only indicator of what might have been is a green sign at the top of the entryway. "African-American History," it says. ]
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Ted Roche @tedroche.contoocook.org · 25/06/2026
Bluto could have taken them all...
The late John Belushi as Bluto in Animal House (1978)
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Ted Roche @tedroche.contoocook.org · 23/06/2026
I mean, even Unicode is woke.
Screenshot of page from Code table.NET showing the Unicode Decimal Code &#8647; is a leftwards Paired arrows symbol.
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Ted Roche @tedroche.contoocook.org · 22/06/2026
Thick outlines on a thin coast. The mapmakers got carried away trying to outline the shore Down East and made quite the inkblot! Here's a prettier one that hides that mess.
Daily Decision Support Briefing dated June 22, 2026 2:40 AM retrieved from https://www.weather.gov/gyx/weatherstory. Map shows alternating bands of total rain from 1-1.5" tapering to 0.25-0.5" bottom to top in diagonals from southwest to northeast across New Hampshire and lower Maine.
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Ted Roche @tedroche.contoocook.org · 20/06/2026
If the time is right, monarch butterflies may feed on the flower nectar, and perhaps lay eggs on the underside of the leaves. The leaves are then food for the caterpillars.
Monarch butterfly caterpillar feasting on milkweed leaves. Copyright © 2021 Ted Roche, licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike-NonCommercial license per https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/4.0/ - briefly, share with attribution "By Ted Roche", under the same license, without commercial use.
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Ted Roche @tedroche.contoocook.org · 19/06/2026
My God. It's full of ones and zeroes.
Keir Dullea, as Dr. Dave Bowman, the  [*SPOILER ALERT*] sole surviving astronaut following the murders by the AI named HAL, travelling through the monolith and becoming the Star Child. Or something. Award winning movie, "2001: A Space Odessey" (1968) produced by Stanley Kubrick and based on the (much better, IMHO) book by the late Arthur C. Clarke.
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Ted Roche @tedroche.contoocook.org · 17/06/2026
The David Steinberg Show (1972)
The David Steinberg Show (1972)
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Ted Roche @tedroche.contoocook.org · 15/06/2026
And, ... live again:
Livestream of a weather cam aimed at the White House, captioned "Washington, D.C. USA June 14, 2026 8:20 PM"
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Ted Roche @tedroche.contoocook.org · 08/06/2026
Forecast is high for a while. Welcome to late spring!
Screenshot from https://www.pollen.com showing 5 day allergy forecast for Contoocook, NH: MTW High, TF Medium-High
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Ted Roche @tedroche.contoocook.org · 04/06/2026
Despite our 150% normal rains last month, northeastern New England is still in a serious drought deficit, not as bad as the Colorado River basin, but not a good trend.
Slide titled "Precipitation departures from normal" dated May 21, 2026 1:24 EDT showing three maps of Maine and New Hampshire, subtitled "Last 30 days," "Year to Date" and "Since June 1, 2025". The Last 30 days are much improved with the NH seacoast still 2" below normal and the rest less. The Year To Date shows a wider area of NH and southern Main in the range of 5" deficite, and the Since June 1 map showing approximately half of the region,  in the southeast diagonal with extremes  20" deficit at the coasts, 15" for most of the middle tapering to 7" or 8" at the Vermont border. Source: https://www.weather.gov/media/gyx/DGT/DGT_GYX_05212026.pdf
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Ted Roche @tedroche.contoocook.org · 29/05/2026
Stupid idea then, stupid idea now.
Clippy, the Microsoft writing assistant, R.I.P.
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Ted Roche @tedroche.contoocook.org · 25/05/2026
Yesterday's 0.50" of rain tipped May over the 30-year-monthly average rain total, the first time this has happened in the 8 months of the "water year" of Oct'25 - 26. Private wells, agriculture, summer water tourism, and wildfires are a concern. #HotDrySummer #wxNH #CoCoRaHS
Graph titled "Monthly Precipitation from Oct 01, 2025 to May 25, 2026" showing gray bars of 30 year monthly average (PRISM) and green bars showing actual precipitation, all but the last bar noticably lower than the average.e
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Ted Roche @tedroche.contoocook.org · 15/05/2026
Mr. President, it's too much.
Quote from Donald Trump, April 12, 2016, "We're gonna win so much, you may even get tired of winning. And you'll say, 'Please, please. It's too much winning. We can't take it anymore. Mr. President, it's too much.'
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Ted Roche @tedroche.contoocook.org · 14/05/2026
Excerpted paragraph from the linked article: "Are New Hampshire citizens aware that our legislature has drastically changed and that there are no longer two parties there? There is no bipartisanship. There is one party, the NH Free Staters, controlling the House. Are NH citizens aware that some of the bills being produced by the Free Staters will cause property taxes to increase, that local control will disintegrate, that services for NH citizens will decrease, that businesses will be economically hurt, that citizens will not have more rights, but will have fewer rights, and that it is all supported by big money PACs from out of state? It is time for NH citizens to pay attention and to understand what is really happening in the legislature. It is time for NH citizens to step forward and speak up. NH does not belong to the Free Staters."
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Ted Roche @tedroche.contoocook.org · 08/05/2026
Ladies and gentlemen: the CHAIR of the NH House Transportation Committee: “It is against the law to run over pedestrians. It's against the law to run bicycles off the road even though it's sometimes very tempting.”
"Roghly every 25 days, a person walking or biking is killed in New Hampshire by someone driving a motor vehicle. That’s the 10‑year average: one death every 25 days. And despite advances in collision‑avoidance technology, it’s getting worse. The five‑year average increased by 54% — from 10 to 15.4 deaths per year — between 2009 and 2025."
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Ted Roche @tedroche.contoocook.org · 07/05/2026
You Go!
Quote from Dr. Suess: "I am the Lorax. I speak for the trees. I speak for the trees for the trees have no tongues." A background of mountains in blue silhouette and a golden sky. Source: https://quotefancy.com/media/wallpaper/3840x2160/4700193-Dr-Seuss-Quote-I-am-the-Lorax-I-speak-for-the-trees-I-speak-for.jpg
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Ted Roche @tedroche.contoocook.org · 23/04/2026
Without ALT tag, all I see is "Tonight!" Help reach your audience that DEPENDS on accessibility with Settings, Accessiblity, "Require Alt text before posting ☑️" will help remind you. ProTip: it also improves your searchability and rankings!
Bluesky Settings, Accessibility, subhead "Alt text" two checkboxes:
Require Alt text before posting ☑️
Display Larger Alt text badges ☑️
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Ted Roche @tedroche.contoocook.org · 17/04/2026
Indeed. en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Poe's_law
 Leonard Hoffstedder holding up a quickly-scribbled "SARCASM" sign behind a furious Penny confronting a cluless Sheldon. "The Big Bang Theory"
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Ted Roche @tedroche.contoocook.org · 10/04/2026
A couple days of dry, windy weather and NH fire danger went from low, thru medium to HIGH. Check with local fire authorities before doing any outdoor burning. contoocook.org/wxNHfiredang...
Poster "FIRE DANGER TODAY!" with NH Forest logo, a scale pointing to "High" and Smoky the Bear, with subtitles "PREVENT WILDFIRES" and a link to NHFirePermit.com
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Ted Roche @tedroche.contoocook.org · 07/04/2026
Don't take it seriously...
Blue-green terminal screen, perhaps inspired by "War Games" which asks " SHALL WE PLAY A GAME?" and lists (also in caps, I lack a caps-lock key today): "Tic-tac-toe, Blackjack, Gin Rummy, Hearts, Bridge, Checkers, Chess, Poker, Fighter Combat, Guerrilla Engagement, Desert Warfare, Air-to-ground Actions, Theaterwide Tactical Warfare, Theaterwide Biotoxic and Chemical Warfare, Global Thermonuclear War."
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Ted Roche @tedroche.contoocook.org · 31/03/2026
A backgrounder to GB's Atlantic Bastion strategy, referenced in the article: www.fpri.org/article/2025...
A paragraph from the linked article (https://www.fpri.org/article/2025/08/atlantic-bastion-the-future-of-anti-submarine-warfare/), "The Russian Threat
The Russian Navy maintains one of the most formidable and varied submarine fleets in the world, of around 64 vessels – strategic ballistic missile submarines (SSBNs), nuclear-powered attack submarines (SSNs), and diesel-electric attack submarines (SSKs).[2] These submarines are stationed across Russia’s geostrategically important bases, including those on the Kola peninsula and in the Far East in Vladivostok, enabling Russia to project maritime power in both the Atlantic and Pacific theaters."
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Ted Roche @tedroche.contoocook.org · 25/03/2026
Sometimes I think the crows are just mocking the dogs.
Caption: "Donning his new canine decoder, Professor Schwartzman becomes the first human being on Earth to hear what barking dogs are actually saying." Cartoon has four dogs doing dog thinks, chasing cars, barking at the professor, barking over the fence, with work balloons which ALL say "Hey! Hey! Hey! Hey! Hey! Hey! Hey! Hey! Hey! "
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Ted Roche @tedroche.contoocook.org · 17/03/2026
Turn Around Don't Drown® -- if the roadway is underwater, you can't tell if the roadway is still there and has not been undermined. A few inches of fast-moving water can sweep an adult off their feet, less than a foot can drag a car away. Don't risk it.
Yellow diamond highway sign with black block letters saying "WHEN FLOODED TURN AROUND DON'T DROWN." Turn Around Don't Drown (yes, without a comma) is a registered trademark of NOAA. Used IAC with guidance at https://www.weather.gov/safety/flood-turn-around-dont-drown.
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Ted Roche @tedroche.contoocook.org · 15/03/2026
Hashtag WINNING!!! #ProjectEpicDistractFromEpsteinFilesFury #ReleaseTheEpsteinFiles
GasBuddy.com graph of 6 month average retail price chart for regular gas, showing $3.17 on 9/15 dropping as low as $2.73 on 1/5 and 1/12 and rising to $3.71 on 3/15. Shared via Paul Krugman's column on https://paulkrugman.substack.com/p/costs-and-benefits-from-the-new-energy?
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