Thursday Overnight Open Thread - February 3, 2026 [Doof]

Welcome to the Tuesday night ONT. So glad you could make it!

Feel good story

13-year-old Ditches Lifejacket and Makes ‘Superhuman’ Swim to Save Family Swept out to Sea

A 13-year-old boy has been hailed as a hero after swimming 4 hours through rough seas to rescue his family.

A family of 4 was enjoying a holiday in Australia’s southwest coast near Quindalup when strong winds blew their inflatable paddleboards out to sea. The boy was separated from his mom and 2 siblings before his canoe began to take on water.

Wearing a life-jacket, he began to swim against the wind towards the shore, knowing every second counted in the race to get help to save his family.

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“And the brave fella thought he’s not going to make it with a life jacket on, so he ditched it, and he swam the next 2 hours without a life jacket,” said Bresland. “I thought, ‘Mate, that is incredible.'”

Once ashore he successfully raised the alarm and a multi-agency search and rescue operation was mobilized, including Western Australia state Water Police and its rescue helicopter. The teen provided detailed descriptions of the paddleboards, and within the hour, his family was rescued by boat, having drifted 7 miles out into the Indian Ocean.

2 hours of swimming?!? Wow, way to go young dude!

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Speaking of good stuff from the younger generation

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Almost as smooth as Weasel Buddy!

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El Rushbo used to talk about "demonstrating absurdity by being absurd". This guy would make the Maha Rushie proud!

His name is Josh Seiter. Check out his X account.

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Vehicles used to be a lot cooler. Any of you out there willing to admit you're not really 29, and you remember wraparound windshields?

Why Automakers Abandoned Wraparound Windshields After The 1950s

The wraparound windshield once was a trend in the automotive world. It's a design solution in which the windshield is built forming a curve toward each side of the cabin. As a result, the frontmost pillars, the ones between the windshield and the front window of each side, are displaced away from the car's front end, and the window next to it becomes narrower. That solution has been used on the rear windshield, too, where the wraparound design displaces the rearmost pillars in the opposite way — or, sometimes, wraps around the other way.

This trend is credited to the 1951 GM Le Sabre, a concept car dreamed up by Harley Earl and inspired by jet fighters — remember, jet design was all the rage in America back then. The Le Sabre's wraparound windshield resembled the canopies used in jet fighters and only became a reality after the industry spent years improving the technology for it. After GM started using it in mass production in 1953, Ford and Chrysler quickly followed suit. Over the following years, it was used on other cars despite the need to adapt the original design — the Le Sabre was a convertible concept car, so it didn't have the conventional roof and windows of a sedan or station wagon.

Sadly, wraparound windshields were largely dropped from automotive design in the 1960s; newer examples are much rarer. Among the practical reasons, having such a large glass area made the cabin excessively hot, especially in warm weather, and occupants would feel too visible from the outside. From a technical point of view, the curved glass causes some distortion on the sides. Besides, using larger glass areas led to making the pillars thinner, which raised concern that the cabin would become less resistant in a collision.

Check out the whole thing. Article contains some cool links to other car stuff.

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Do not even try to pretend THIS guy has a dildo!

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Those of you who were here on Sunday night were treated to an amazing sunset photo from lurker "Howard in Alberta". I previously featured one of his sunrise photos. Anyway, there were some questions in the comments about his photo

Did Howard in Alberta say where that pic was taken? I'd have to go about 30 miles West to see the Rockies like that. They are just below the horizon for me. Posted by: Alberta Oil Peon at February 01, 2026 11:09 PM (8zz6B) ** Maybe he's lurking and will chime in. If not, I will ask him. Posted by: Doof at February 01, 2026 11:15 PM (QMAsf) ** That line of brush looks like a caragana hedge. Commonly planted all over Alberta and Saskatchewan as a windbreak. Posted by: Alberta Oil Peon at February 01, 2026 11:18 PM (8zz6B)

From the photographer himself!

Just read the comments, and here are answers to some questions/comments:

Location of the Alberta sunset (and previous photo of sunrise) is extreme SW Alberta, east of Waterton Lakes National Park. The mountains are the southern Canadian Rockies.

And yes, the hedge is caragana. Anyone can have one, but the secret is to have personally planted it fifty years ago.

Howard

Thanks for the follow-up, Howard! Keep those photos coming!

DJ Doof - Guess The Theme

New difficulty scale in effect. Easy / Moderate / Difficult. This one is Easy.

What's the common thread / common meaning / common leitmotif?

Weekly commenter stats for week of 2-1-2026

AoSHQ Commenter Statistics:
Number of posts: 109
Number of comments: 25562
Number of unique hashes: 2080

Top 10 commenters:
1 [479 comments] 'TheJamesMadison, searching for twisted thrills with Park Chan-wook' [68.02 posts/day]
2 [409 comments] 'Sponge - F*ck Cancer'
3 [358 comments] 'whig'
4 [349 comments] 'Bulg'
5 [347 comments] 'Joe Mannix (Not a cop!)'
6 [312 comments] 'Skip'
7 [280 comments] 'Aetius451AD work phone'
8 [252 comments] 'man'
9 [245 comments] ' Braenyard - some Absent Friends are more equal than others _'
10 [244 comments] 'FenelonSpoke'

Top 10 sockpuppeteers:
1 [152 names] 'Blind Monk Miklos of Shaolin' [21.58 unique names/day]
2 [137 names] 'Quarter Twenty '
3 [109 names] 'Bang! Ding! Ow!'
4 [109 names] 'RIP you big dummy'
5 [62 names] 'Count de Monet'
6 [54 names] 'Randolph Duke'
7 [46 names] 'Duncanthrax'
8 [37 names] 'pookysgirl, trying to keep crackers down'
9 [35 names] 'Most people '
10 [33 names] 'Moron Analyst'

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posted by Open Blogger at 10:00 PM

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