Matthew Prorok
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mattprorok.bsky.social
Matthew Prorok
@mattprorok.bsky.social
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mattprorok.bsky.social
Made some focaccia.
Freshly baked focaccia bread, topped with roasted garlic, rosemary, and asiago.
August 24, 2025 at 5:19 PM
mattprorok.bsky.social
Doubtful.
The top 20 times for the women's 1500m swimming event, all of which are held by Katie Ledecky.
August 4, 2025 at 2:06 AM
mattprorok.bsky.social
A three panel comic featuring a dog in a top hat holding a ball in its mouth. In the first panel, the dog asks "Pls spend??" In the second panel, an arm labeled "workers" tries to take the ball, only for the dog to take on an angry expression and say "NO WAGE!!" In the third panel, the dog, still angry, insists "ONLY SPEND"
July 3, 2025 at 5:36 PM
mattprorok.bsky.social
Additionally, the idea that you can't engage in diplomacy with Iran is ludicrous, because diplomacy with Iran was one of the crowning achievements for US diplomats in the 21st century until Trump literally threw it away, and then the PM of Israel urged Biden not to rejoin it.
A graph of the Development of Iran's Uranium Stockpile, showing a sharp drop off in 2015 when the JCPOA came into effect, followed by a steady increase starting in 2019 after the US left the JCPOA.
June 13, 2025 at 8:34 PM
mattprorok.bsky.social
Almost forgot this one, which was like a whole landscape on the top of an old wooden post.
A close-up of moss and white mushrooms on top of a decaying wooden post
June 6, 2025 at 3:42 PM
mattprorok.bsky.social
Saw some interesting white jelly fungus and what I think is a Wrinkled Peach the other day.
White jelly fungus growing among moss on a rotting log White jelly fungus growing among moss on a rotting log White jelly fungus growing among moss on a rotting log A small Wrinkled Peach mushroom in leaf litter next to a fallen log
June 6, 2025 at 3:39 PM
mattprorok.bsky.social
My dog is very comfortable, just snoozing away like nothing is wrong, after he stole my wife's underwear and chewed the crotch out of them.
A black dog with a white muzzle sleeping peacefully A black dog with a white muzzle sleeping peacefully
May 26, 2025 at 5:48 AM
mattprorok.bsky.social
Heck, even Feynman wrote about it.
There is a most profound and beautiful question associated with the observed coupling constant, e - the amplitude for a real electron to emit or absorb a real photon. It is a simple number that has been experimentally determined to be close to 0.08542455. (My physicist friends won't recognize this number, because they like to remember it as the inverse of its square: about 137.03597 with about an uncertainty of about 2 in the last decimal place. It has been a mystery ever since it was discovered more than fifty years ago, and all good theoretical physicists put this number up on their wall and worry about it.) Immediately you would like to know where this number for a coupling comes from: is it related to pi or perhaps to the base of natural logarithms? Nobody knows. It's one of the greatest damn mysteries of physics: a magic number that comes to us with no understanding by man. You might say the "hand of God" wrote that number, and "we don't know how He pushed his pencil." We know what kind of a dance to do experimentally to measure this number very accurately, but we don't know what kind of dance to do on the computer to make this number come out, without putting it in secretly! Richard P. Feynman, QED: The Strange Theory of Light and Matter
May 13, 2025 at 7:38 PM
mattprorok.bsky.social
Ohio Republicans came up with a fix for his concerns in their recent higher education bill. Predictably, it sucked.
Sec. 3345.382. (A) As used in this section, "state institution of higher education" has the same meaning as in section 3345.011 of the Revised Code. (B) Each state institution of higher education shall develop a course with not fewer than three credit hours in the subject area of American civic literacy. The course shall include a study of the American economic system and capitalism. The course shall comply with the criteria, policies, and procedures established under section 3333.16 of the Revised Code. The course may be offered under the college credit plus program established under Chapter 3365. of the Revised Code. The course shall, at a minimum, require each student to read all the following: (1) The entire Constitution of the United States; (2) The entire Declaration of Independence; (3) A minimum of five essays in their entirety from the Federalist Papers. The essays shall be selected by the department chair. (4) The entire Emancipation Proclamation; (5) The entire Gettysburg Address; (6) The entire Letter from Birmingham Jail written by Dr. Martin Luther King Jr; (7) The writings of Adam Smith, including a study of the principles written in The Wealth of Nations. Any student who takes the course shall be required to pass a cumulative final examination at the conclusion of the course that assesses student proficiency about the documents described in divisions (B)(1) to (7) of this section. Each state institution of higher education board of trustees shall adopt a resolution approving a plan to offer the course developed under this section. Each state institution shall submit that plan to the chancellor of higher education. The chancellor shall review and approve each plan. Prior to
May 13, 2025 at 11:25 AM
mattprorok.bsky.social
The people who wrote those documents explicitly said that this is what they were doing, and that it was really important. Like, it's at the very beginning of the Federalist Papers.
Federalist No. 1 General Introduction For the Independent Journal. Author: Alexander Hamilton To the People of the State of New York: AFTER an unequivocal experience of the inefficiency of the subsisting federal government, you are called upon to deliberate on a new Constitution for the United States of America. The subject speaks its own importance; comprehending in its consequences nothing less than the existence of the UNION, the safety and welfare of the parts of which it is composed, the fate of an empire in many respects the most interesting in the world. It has been frequently remarked that it seems to have been reserved to the people of this country, by their conduct and example, to decide the important question, whether societies of men are really capable or not of establishing good government from reflection and choice, or whether they are forever destined to depend for their political constitutions on accident and force. If there be any truth in the remark, the crisis at which we are arrived may with propriety be regarded as the era in which that decision is to be made; and a wrong election of the part we shall act may, in this view, deserve to be considered as the general misfortune of mankind. This idea will add the inducements of philanthropy to those of patriotism, to heighten the solicitude which all considerate and good men must feel for the event. Happy will it be if our choice should be directed by a judicious estimate of our true interests, unperplexed and unbiased by considerations not connected with the public good. But this is a thing more ardently to be wished than seriously to be expected. The plan offered to our deliberations affects too many particular interests, innovates upon too many local institutions, not to involve in its discussion a variety of objects foreign to its merits, and of views, passions and prejudices little favorable to the discovery of truth.
May 6, 2025 at 5:46 PM
mattprorok.bsky.social
I'm not a perfect person by any measure, but I can make a good gumbo.
A bowl of chicken and sausage gumbo with rice
May 4, 2025 at 4:57 AM
mattprorok.bsky.social
On the other hand, the Dominican Republic has 11.3 million people.
A graph showing Puerto Rico's GDP per capita A graph showing the Dominican Republic's GDP per capita
April 30, 2025 at 7:00 PM
mattprorok.bsky.social
A comic illustrating the following: "And that's the crux of the economic case for open borders. We should focus on individuals, not averages. If, for example, the world of today looks like this... Average native income: $50,000. Average foreign income: $5000. Then the world of open borders would look like this... Average native income: $60,000. Average foreign income: $20,000. Average combined income: $40,000. If you see these numbers and say "the world of open borders is economically inferior," you are committing the arithmetic fallacy.
April 30, 2025 at 12:57 AM
mattprorok.bsky.social
Henry Cavill dirties up good.
Henry Cavill as Geralt of Rivia, holding a sword and giving an angry side-eye Henry Cavill as Geralt of Rivia, holding a sword in a reverse grip and looking tired but defiant
April 20, 2025 at 9:34 PM
mattprorok.bsky.social
I think the wontons actually came out pretty good, though.
A plate of browned miniature wontons.
April 19, 2025 at 12:41 AM
mattprorok.bsky.social
Carl Sagan, wearing a light gray turtleneck and black blazer, leaning on his hand and smiling
April 18, 2025 at 10:35 AM
mattprorok.bsky.social
Repost the first album you bought with your own money
The album cover for The Red Hot Chili Peppers "Californication"
April 16, 2025 at 11:04 PM
mattprorok.bsky.social
April 16, 2025 at 7:57 PM
mattprorok.bsky.social
This doofus is mine.
A black brindle dog, a half pug, laying in a plush tan rocking chair
April 5, 2025 at 11:42 PM
mattprorok.bsky.social
A man frustratedly exclaiming "I guess" in response to something that is correct, but annoying.
April 5, 2025 at 12:43 AM
mattprorok.bsky.social
There's a reason this tweet was popular.
A July 1, 2017 tweet from @InternetHippo saying "Just got back from the centrist rally. Amazing turnout. Thousands of people holding hands and chanting 'Better things aren’t possible'"
April 2, 2025 at 4:02 PM
mattprorok.bsky.social
A meme in which Fred from Scooby Doo unmasks a villain labeled "neither left nor right" as actually having been "the right" all along.
April 1, 2025 at 5:51 PM
mattprorok.bsky.social
Letter from Birmingham Jail (ext) By Rev. Martin Luther King, Jr., 16 April 1963 "First, I must confess that over the last few years I have been gravely disappointed with the white moderate. I have almost reached the regrettable conclusion that the Negro's great stumbling block in the stride toward freedom is not the White Citizen's Council-er or the Ku Klux Klanner, but the white moderate who is more devoted to "order" than to justice; who prefers a negative peace which is the absence of tension to a positive peace which is the presence of justice; who constantly says "I agree with you in the goal you seek, but I can't agree with your methods of direct action;" who paternalistically feels he can set the timetable for another man's freedom; who lives by the myth of time and who constantly advises the Negro to wait until a "more convenient season." Shallow understanding from people of goodwill is more frustrating than absolute misunderstanding from people of ill will. Lukewarm acceptance is much more bewildering than outright rejection."
March 27, 2025 at 12:18 AM
mattprorok.bsky.social
A goose chase meme, aggressively asking a fleeing Mark Zuckerberg "What did he get done? What did Andrew Jackson get done, Mark?"
March 25, 2025 at 11:35 AM
mattprorok.bsky.social
Look, Phineas's eyebrows float above his head. The Tri-State Area is strange territory.
Phineas, one of the main characters of "Phineas and Ferb," singing into a microphone.
March 12, 2025 at 12:02 PM