Not in my neighborhood, apparently

 

The lists go on ... this one, from Fodor's Travel, lists the 10 Best Burgers in America (like that one hasn't been done before).  Still, they are intriguing.  The nearest one to Maryland is in Boston, so I'm not taking a road trip just for that purpose.  But if you're in the neighborhood and don't mind dishing out some serious cash for fancy ground beef, go right ahead.

The 10 Best Burgers in the United States

The one that intrigues me the most is from Pasjoli, in Santa Monica, CA, and I won't be visiting there anytime soon.

Now, for something simpler and easy to find, I just found out that the Texas Roadhouse franchise has a "Texas Roadhouse Roadkill" dish.  A picture of what purports to be the actual restaurant version is shown below. Apparently this one is fairly easy to imitate at home, and some of the picture of the homemade imitations look pretty darned good.  It's basically just ground beef, egg, onion, mushrooms, cheese, and a mix of steaky spices.  I've never been to the Texas Roadhouse, but I'm tempted to try making this myself.  Maybe there should be a "Top 10 Texas Roadhouse Roadkill Copycat Recipes" list.

Depending on the weather

 

Just found this out:  depending on the weather (specifically the humidity), sweat bees can change color from blue to green.

Sweat bees change color based on humidity levels

I figured that since the video says scientists discovered this in April 2026, there must be a paper about it. So I went and looked ... These Bees Change Color With the Weather and Scientists Finally Know Why.  This article has a link to the actual paper in the journal Biology Letters, and I've got that linked below.  

Humidity induces structural colour change and contributes to biogeographic colour variation in sweat bees

After all that, there must be pictures, right?  Of course there are pictures.

Lighthouse of the Week, April 26 - May 2, 2026: Kep i Treporteve (Zvërnec) Lighthouse, Albania

 

Though Albania has a lot of coast on the Adriatic for a small country, as the Lighthouse Directory says, there isn't a lot of information about lighthouses there. I've featured one before this. Most of them are not the traditional tower and light shape that lighthouse fans are accustomed to.  At least this one has a tower.

The name is a bit confusing:  The Directory uses Kep i Treporteve (kep means cape), but you'll find more pictures of it with Zvërnec, though not many. It's near Vlorë. Here's the map to show where it is. Zoom IN to see the interesting situation of it (and also one of the pictures shows it). Apparently the nearby monastery is also something for tourists to see.

This is what the Directory says about it:

"Date unknown. Active; focal plane 18 m (59 ft); white flash every 5 s. 10 m (33 ft) 2-stage stucco-covered stone tower; upper portion octagonal, lower portion square. The lighthouse is unpainted. A building near the lighthouse may be a keeper's house. ... Located on the northeast side of the entrance to the Gji i Vlorës, about 8 km (5 mi) east of Sazan Island and the same distance northwest of Vlorë."

 There are three of the few pictures that are findable of this lighthouse below.

Black and white and back

 

From my archives.

Guess the theme.

Susanna Canzian

French Open (tennis) final thoughts

 

A bit of time ago, I commented about the French Open at the midpoint of the tournament.  At that time, I thought that it was unlikely anyone could beat Sabalenka on the women's side. I forgot that Sabalenka is capable of defeating Sabalenka at just about any time, and that's what happened.  Still, I expect that the big hitters will show up fine on grass, with her and Rybakina going deep.

Young and up-and-coming Mirra Andreeva stepped in to the power gap, and showed that she's probably going to meet expectations and be a player who makes a lot of quarters and semis and finals in the future. She's young and cute, it will also be interesting to see how she matures as a woman as well as improves as a player.

On the men's side, Zverev took what he was expected to take. His opponent in the final, Flavio Cobolli, benefited a bit from his Italian opponent's sudden sickness, causing him to be unable to play in the semi. So Cobolli played with a lot of energy (important on clay), and gave Zverev some unnerving moments. But in the end, the better player won.  Now, Zverev has had some personality and private life concerns, but he's not the first and won't be the last. As a player, he deserved to win this when he had the opportunity, and I'm glad he did.

Now, on to Wimbledon.