Morocco rocked by 6.8 quake: Late Friday, a 6.8 earthquake in the High Atlas mountain range shook towns and villages as well as bigger cities nearby, including Marrakech. This is the strongest earthquake to hit Morocco in over 120 years. Lots of buildings made of adobe and unreinforced bricks fell. The death toll currently sits at around 2,500. Rescue teams are working to find survivors under rubble. However, some are criticizing the Moroccan government for a slow and uncoordinated response. 

Some quake footage:

Hotels as housing update: King County has bought up eight hotels and several apartment buildings through the Health Through Housing program, which is intended to get unhoused people off the streets. So far, King County has housed 803 people this way, the Seattle Times reports. It seems like it's going okay. A UW study found "911 calls dropped 75% when people moved from congregate shelters to hotels." One lingering problem, however, is overdoses. With hotel rooms having closed doors, people may overdose alone. Nine have died from an overdose in the hotel shelter system so far. However, "the majority of deaths of homeless people are occurring outside. Less than 10% of fatal overdoses among homeless people take place in either shelters or hotels." 

The sun is not finished with us: It'll be cool early in the week. Perhaps you'll even assume fall is here for good. Summer, however, refuses to die without a fight. It'll reach the 80s again later in the week and over the weekend. 

A shocking development: Given all the "exploratory" campaigning he's been doing for months this year and the $3.8 million he's raised, I didn't realize good ol' Attorney General Bob Ferguson wasn't gubernatorially official yet. Anyway, he announced his true intentions to become the next governor at three events across Washington over the weekend. The current governor—everyone's favorite grandad—Jay Inslee, endorsed him. 

I guess we have to actually start thinking about 2024 now: The governor's race is crowded with hopefuls. In the Democratic corner, we have Ferguson facing off against Washington Public Lands Commissioner Hilary Franz and political speed bump Sen. Mark Mullet of the 5th Legislative District. In the Republican corner, Former King County Sheriff and 8th Congressional District US Representative Dave Reichert is running. Personally, instead of winning the governorship via vote, I think everyone should have to face off in a simul chess match against Ferguson. 

Two shot in Ballard: Last night at around 8:30 pm two people were shot near the 7500 block of 15th Avenue Northwest. Cops arrested a suspect. Everyone involved was in their 30s. 

Finally: Spanish soccer federation president Luis Rubiales says he'll resign after facing backlash, suspension, and sexual assault charges for forcibly kissing one of his players on the month last month. 

Boosters are coming: A new COVID booster shot could be coming any day now. Though, officials are moving away from the "booster" terminology. Oops, my bad. The powers that be want people to start thinking about this new vaccine the way we think about flu shots—annual immunizations. Don't be a dummy: Get a shot once they're officially rolled out, and get a flu shot while you're at it.

Pennsylvania can't find escaped murderer: Danelo Souza Cavalcante was detained in a suburban Pennsylvania jail for killing his ex-girlfriend. He was awaiting transfer to a state prison when he escaped by "scaling a wall, climbing over razor wire and jumping from a roof." He was gone a full hour before guards realized he was missing. It's been a week-and-a-half and Cavalcante is still on the lam, according to the Associated Press. In that time, he's stolen and ditched a Dairy delivery truck, made it out of the search area, donned a disguise, and attempted to contact acquaintances. Around 600 cops will take part in search efforts on Monday.

Climate protests over the weekend: Over 10,000 climate activists demonstrated on a highway in the Netherlands this weekend to protest continued government fossil fuel subsidies. Police fired water canons at the crowd and detained 2,400 people. 

OpenAI uses a fuckton of water: Born near an Iowa cornfield, Microsoft's OpenAI requires lots of water to cool down the supercomputer doing all the thinking. Pulling from the watershed of the Raccoon and Des Moines rivers, researchers posit Microsoft uses 500 milliliters of water every time you ask OpenAI a question. "Microsoft's global water consumption spiked 34% from 2021 to 2022 to nearly 1.7 billion gallons," the Associated Press reports. Google's water consumption spiked 20% in the same period. Researchers attribute this to AI. Look, in a time when water scarcity is a real threat worldwide, I'd rather we conserve the water for people rather than use it on computers that think for us, but maybe that's just me. 

9/11, remembered: Well, the terrorist attack that really fucked up the 2000s and the lives of over 3,000 people and their families happened 22 years ago. Will you be watching uniformed men ceremoniously toll bells in remembrance? Reminding yourself which celebrities lied about being at Ground Zero? Eating a 9/11 cookie cake?

Baby Techno: Elon Musk and estranged girlfriend Grimes apparently have three children now. There's X Æ A-Xii, who was born in 2020. Then, there's "Exa Dark Sideræl Musk" who was born in December of 2021 via surrogate. Now, there's a third baby named "Tau Techno Mechanicus." It's unclear when baby Techno was born. I pity these weird kids.