On this day in history 1,334 years ago, the Picts defeated the Northumbrians at the Battle of Nechtansmere, which seemed important at the time.

News Headline: “Missouri lawmaker walks back use of term ‘consensual rape.’ ”
News Headline: “Texas lawwaker calls vaccines ‘sorcery.’ ”
Quick.
Guess which political party.
Go on. Guess.

News Headline: “Trump reignites ‘bromance’ with Putin.”
News Headline: “Trump overlooks horrors of life under Kim Jong Un.”
News Headline: “Donald Trump’s affection for despots.”
Kids, go get grandpa and ask him what it was like when the United States was the leader of the Free World.

News Item: “. . . Nothing yet has seemed to illicit a response from the. . . .”
K.R., a Baltimore reader, writes:
“Elicit spelling there.”
And can it be time for QT’s triennial reminder that what is jury-rigged isn’t always jerry-built?
Evidently.

WRITE TO QT:  qt@zaysmith.com

News Headline: “What ‘Game of Thrones’ is really about.”
It was about 63 hours 30 minutes.
Really.

If the minimum wage had kept pace with Wall Street bonuses over the past decade, it would be $33 an hour.

The nation’s current irony outbreak spread this week to New York City when a worker fell from a billboard advertising a personal-injury law firm.
A new outbreak is expected in Washington D.C. the next time Donald Trump speaks.

News Item: “. . . bar tab from a 1787 farewell party in Philadelphia for George Washington just days before the framers signed off on the Constitution. . . 55 attendees drank 54 bottles of Madeira, 60 bottles of claret, eight of whiskey, 22 of porter, eight of hard cider, 12 of beer and seven bowls of alcoholic punch. . . .”
Which helps explain the Second Amendment.

News Headline: “Is Trump starting an ‘autocrats club’?”
News Headline: “Is Steve Mnuchin breaking the law?”
News Headline: “Will you listen to Al Franken’s new political podcast?”
News Headline: “Free college?”
News Headline: “Trump supporters?”
Yes, yes, yes, yes, sigh.
See how easy?

Beware the ides of National Artisan Gelato Month.