The New York Times:

George J. Kresge, who as the entertainer the Amazing Kreskin used mentalist tricks to dazzle audiences as he rose to fame on late-night television in the 1970s, died on Tuesday in Wayne, N.J. He was 89. A close friend, Meir Yedid, said the death, at an assisted living facility, was from complications of dementia.

Kreskin’s feats included divining details of strangers’ personal lives and guessing at playing cards chosen randomly from a deck. And he had a classic trick at live shows: entrusting audience members to hide his paycheck in the auditorium, and then relying on his instincts to find it — or else going without payment for a night.

Somehow his first appearance with Letterman wasn’t until 1990, but after that he was a regular. Just a canonical “late night talk show guest” of that era. He was good at the mentalist tricks, but what made Kreskin great — amazing even — was that he was just such a weird, fun, and funny guy.

In addition to two choices for t-shirts, the new DF Paraphernalia store also has the above hoodies, which are pretty nice, I have to say. I particularly like the drawstrings, which are much more substantial, almost rope-like, than the shoelace-like strings on most hoodies. I wear mine a lot, especially in the winter, as an extra layer. You’d look good in one.

Here’s the thing. The store will not be open year-round. We’re taking orders now, printing to meet demand, and then we’re going to close it down. Order tonight or tomorrow, and if you’re in the U.S., yours should arrive before Christmas. International orders — even those ordered by our good neighbors in Canada — most likely will not.

Reporting from The Information suggests that an M-series tier above Ultra might remain years away.

Erik Hayden, reporting for The Hollywood Reporter:

For his next move, David Letterman is jumping in to the increasingly crowded free, ad-supported TV channel (FAST) space.

The late-night great’s production company Worldwide Pants has inked a deal with Samsung TV Plus to bring around 4,000 hours of original video to the company’s streaming service, the firms said Wednesday. “I’m very excited about this,” stated Letterman, who glibly added, “Now I can watch myself age without looking in the mirror!”

The output for the 24/7 on-demand channel titled Letterman TV appears to rely heavily on archival clips from his nearly 33-year late-night run, including his CBS Late Show Top Ten lists, “Stupid Tricks” segments, interviews with stars, holiday specials and behind-the-scenes clips along with fresh commentary from Letterman, presumably on all the above.

I don’t know how different this will be from Letterman’s excellent YouTube channel, but honest to god I’d never even heard of “Samsung TV Plus” until reading this.

Orion Protonentis (release notes): There are all-new Shortcuts actions (Complete Action, Complete Project, and Find Folders), Shortcuts actions that have gained additional powers (Today’s Forecast now supports due, deferred, tagged, and flagged actions), and Shortcuts actions that have been re-written (Add TaskPaper, Find Projects, and Find Tags) or re-written and renamed for clarity (Add Action […]