April 11
Priscilla, Queen Of The Desert, Found
Region 9 has thrown up a detective story for archaeologists.
Pompeii: Breathtaking new paintings found at ancient city A wide residential and commercial block, known as "Region 9", is being cleared of several metres of overlying pumice and ash thrown out by Vesuvius almost 2,000 years ago.(Pompeii previously)
Lengthy how-I-get-to-sleep notes
"Notes on sleep" by Jed Hartman: "For many years, I had various forms of insomnia, and I still occasionally have trouble falling asleep and/or wake up too early and can’t get back to sleep. This page covers some of the things that have and haven’t helped me with that." And: "2024 sleep masterpost" by Azure Jane Lunatic (Azz for short): "Occasionally people on the internet ask for the community's collected wisdom about sleep. This is what I can think of for my own sleep routines, tips, and tricks, plus what I do about various confounding factors.... I have Delayed Sleep Phase Syndrome, primary insomnia, sleep maintenance insomnia, and ADHD." The latter has people sharing their experiences in the comments. (Disclaimer: I know both these people.)
Hey voter voter voter voter... SWING!
See how demographic swings could impact the 2024 election: 538's new Swing-O-Matic shows which states could flip under different scenarios. [ABC News]. 538's Swing-O-Matic page gets interactive under the bold headline Create your own scenario with a bunch of sliders you can push back and forth to see how minor demographic shifts might have major implications for the 2024 US Presidential election.
Columnists and Their Lives of Quiet Desperation
Most columnists are mediocre. This is not their fault. Almost no one on earth is capable of having two good ideas per week... [more inside]
OJ Simpson dead at 76
OJ Simpson dead at 76 Remember the slow white suv LA chase?
Following in her hoofsteps
Exploring the Wallowas with the modern-day "Horsewomen of the Hen Party" The descendants of Jean Birnie, founder of the Oregon Hen Party previously, follow her journeys into the Wallowas on horseback, surmounting challenges, deepening bonds, and absorbing the beauty of nature, in this documentary short from OPB.
Two tennis balls surgically removed from scrub python
Two tennis balls surgically removed from scrub python. A Far North Queensland wildlife carer says he has seen just about everything in his 20 years on the job until he was called about a surprise find in a Cooktown backyard.
Welcome the new Overlords
How Did American Capitalism Mutate Into American Corporatism
In short, this corporatism – in all its iterations including the regulatory state and the patent war chest that maintains and enforces monopoly – is the core source of all the current despotism.
In short, this corporatism – in all its iterations including the regulatory state and the patent war chest that maintains and enforces monopoly – is the core source of all the current despotism.
Akebono Tarō has left the ring
Hawai'ian born sumo legend Chadwick Haheo Rowan, better known worldwide as Akebono, the first non-Japanese-born wrestler to reach grand master / yokozuna has died of heart failure. He was 54.
The Devil Went Down to Georgia
For years, a mysterious figure preyed on gay men in Atlanta. People on the streets called him the Handcuff Man--but the police knew his real name. (CW: homophobia, violence) slTheAtavist
the philosophy of absolute extinction
Philosopher Ben Ware has been giving some thought to the politics of the end of the world, and has written a new book, On Extinction (Verso), to talk about it. But the end is coming fast and maybe you don't have time for a whole book, so let's read some essays instead! "Nothing but the End to Come" brings together Walter Benjamin, Kafka, de Sade and Extinction Rebellion to suggest that all our language about the end feeds "into a politics of passive annihilation." [more inside]
"AI-powered relationship coaching for a new generation of lonely adults"
It was clear to Nyborg that apps such as Tinder were failing their users: designed to keep them coming back, rather than to find a partner and never return. In that moment, it wasn’t fear she felt but empathy. Through letters like this one she had learnt a lot about a particular group of Tinder’s users: those who were “incredibly lonely” ... When she quit, several investors reached out to Nyborg, asking if she planned to start another dating app. Instead Nyborg took a different turn. She began researching loneliness. The new app she came up with looked very different from Tinder. from The loneliness cure [Financial Times; ungated]
Scientific American November 1986
A fascinating glimpse of what was going on in the science world 38 years ago in the November 1986 issue of Scientific American and what has changed and what has remained the same: Voyager 2's visit to Uranus cover story and how a fix had to be made from Earth • Affordable housing problems - "The Shadow Market in Housing" • Learn about the Higgs boson long before it was found (RIP Peter Higgs) • Galileo, Bruno and the Inquisition • Computer Recreations - "Star Trek emerges from the underground to a place in the home-computer arcade" • The Amateur Scientist - "... experiments on three-dimensional vision" • All the 1986 ads, including "Texas Instruments brings the practical applications of AI to your business. Now." (p 15) [more inside]
April 10
The Sun is entering its solar maximum, which excites aurora fans
The Sun is entering its solar maximum. For aurora hunters in Antarctica, there's nothing quite like it. The Sun is putting on a show for Earth, with the highest level of geomagnetic activity in six years. Mawson Station chef Justin Chambers photographed a recent aurora and explains what it's like to watch the spectacle from about as far south as you can go.
As the sun enters the solar maximum — the period of greatest solar activity during its 11-year solar cycle — Mr Chambers said he has witnessed the best aurora of his life, and managed to get it on camera.
Has Uploaded Intelligence been deleted? Or is it hiding on the web?
In September 2022, the first season of animated science fiction series Pantheon debuted on AMC+. By January of the following year, the series was cancelled and wiped from the streaming service, despite the completion of a season 2. [more inside]
Dear {Person's name}
The USPS declared April to be National Card and Letter Writing Month… 23 years ago. American Library Association has some ideas on epistolary fun within games. The Chicago Public Library has suggestions for epistolary novels. The Universal Postal Union has a letter writing competition for writers aged 9 to 15 on the theme: "Write a letter to future generations about the world you hope they inherit." The Smithsonian National Postal Museum has an epistolary fiction project which includes an extensive if not exhaustive list of novels, starting with Xenophon of Ephesus. [more inside]
The Function of Colour in Schools & Hospital
The Function of Colour in Schools & Hospitals, 1930. Just some wonderful illustrations of those things. via.
“I’m so willing to die in shein clothes.”
Super Cute Please Like is a long, fascinating essay by Nicole Lipman in N+1 about fast fashion giant SHEIN, examining its clothes, business practices and history, but touching on fashion blogs, Sinophobia, the origins of fast fashion and gamification.
He is our collective responsibility. They all are.
In this story, we'll follow hundreds of teenagers for the next 24 years, when they’ll be in their late-30s. They're among the thousands of kids who are part of the National Longitudinal Survey of Youth. This means researchers have followed them since their teenage years to the present day – and beyond. from this is a teenager [The Pudding] [more inside]
‘He killed my sister. Now I see his remorse’
The extraordinary stories of survivors of the Rwandan genocide who forgave their attackers (SL Guardian)
How do people overcome such trauma, especially in poor nations with minimal mental healthcare? In 2005, Dutch sociotherapist Cora Dekker developed an affordable, effective method in collaboration with the diocese of Byumba of the Anglican church. This approach, originally used by qualified staff in western clinics to treat military personnel and asylum seekers, was transformed into volunteer work involving trained therapists from local African communities. In Rwanda it is known as Mvura Nkuvure: “I heal you, you heal me.” More than 64,000 Rwandans have completed the therapy.
Justin Trudeau's Last Stand
To self-censor, he says, would mean “I start second-guessing myself and don’t trust my own instincts.” (slTheWalrus) [more inside]
50 birds, the exhibition (a custom LEGO letterpress technique)
The Eurasian Wren, the Barn Swallow, the Northern Goshawk, the Little Owl, the Great Tit. Artist Roy Scholten has created prints of 50 different birds using LEGO bricks as the printing matter. The exhibit opens April 14 at the Grafisch Atelier Hilversum in Hilversum, Netherlands.
The Day May Break
Nick Brandt is a photographer working with themes of climate apocalypse. Sink / Rise is chapter 3 of his series The Day May Break.
Bulldog Utterly Bowled Over
Videos from The Dodo are usually a bit sappy but always heartwarming. However, Bulldog Obsessed With Bowls Gets A Special Delivery [3m20s] is full of exactly the kind of WTF that leads me to post it here.
Herring do?
From Andrew Gregory in the Guardian: Swapping red meat for forage fish such as herring, sardines and anchovies could save 750,000 lives a year and help tackle the climate crisis, a study suggests. Mounting evidence links red meat consumption with a higher risk of disease in humans as well as significant harm to the environment. In contrast, forage fish are highly nutritious, environmentally friendly and the most abundant fish species in the world’s oceans. [more inside]
... will shock you
a webcomic by max graves. tumblr softboy cancelled for involvement in "heavenly creatures" style murder. darkly hilarious exploration of internet fame, isolation, transness and trauma. goes deep into various kinds of internet damage. really can't recommend this enough. [more inside]
“Roaming the greenwood”
Now, the Boys are in Greece. It’s antiquity, but the emotions are American high school: The golden Boy is Achilles, essentially a Harvard-bound football senior, good at everything. He has curly hair and nice feet. He’s popular, in mythic proportions. He is a god training to be a killing machine in an epic war. The other Boy, Patroclus, averts his gaze when Achilles comes around. Patroclus is the narrator, and he is just a human, a curly-haired, olive-skinned boy (Achilles is, of course, blonde; the two genders of gay romance). He sees himself as weak and mortal. An exile with no family and no name. This is you, Patroclus, you worthless piece of shit. from Boy Meets Boy Meets Boys’ Love by Simon Wu [Spike]
April 9
"You better not throw like that in a mud ball fight kid!"
"The invention of the dunk tank clown shows just how far the line of what is considered appropriate for a society has moved over the decades."
'The Last of the Dunk Tank Clowns.'. (archiveorg) "This attraction is now virtually obsolete. Outdoor Amusement Business Association president Greg Chiecko was quoted as claiming he polled his members about dunk tank clowns and that “most say they don’t know of any that still exist today.” (medium) 'Chicago’s Riverview Park and the Racist Dunk Tank'. {CW: Racism. Clowns.}
Dependence is the ultimate freedom
"Davis doesn’t doubt that the housewife’s lifestyle is desirable; she merely regrets that it has been made inaccessible."
Moira Donegan reviews Housewife by Lisa Selin Davis in Bookforum
Have You Eaten?
"The thesis of HAVE YOU EATEN, at the start, was "here's how community actually works," & in the process of making this thing happen, I've felt it in my bones. We show up for each other & frustrate each other & make things together & let each other down & mend each other's hearts. We feed each other." Author Sarah Gailey wrote a 4-part novella at Reactor (fka tordotcom) about queer community in a too-possible future USA. [more inside]
The Meltdown at a Middle School in a Liberal Town
A post-pandemic fight about racism, the respectful treatment of trans kids, and the role of teachers’ unions has divided Amherst, Massachusetts. [The New Yorker]
A massive loss to the physics community
"Besides his outstanding contributions to particle physics, Peter was a very special person, a man of rare modesty, a great teacher and someone who explained physics in a very simple and profound way." [...] "His prediction of the existence of the particle that bears his name was a deep insight, and its discovery at Cern in 2012 was a crowning moment that confirmed his understanding of the way the Universe works." "Even though he didn’t much enjoy it, he felt a responsibility to use the public profile his achievements brought him for the good of science, and he did so many times. The particle that carries his name is perhaps the single most stunning example of how seemingly abstract mathematical ideas can make predictions which turn out to have huge physical consequences."Peter Higgs, physicist who proposed Higgs boson, dies aged 94 [more inside]
Female Hummingbirds Masquerade as Males to Avoid Harassment
Female Hummingbirds Masquerade as Males to Avoid Harassment. One-fifth of female white-necked jacobins sport flashy male-like plumage, which may help them access more food.
“The reading public is best served by diversity”
A detailed, yet accessible, take on the history of book distribution (mainly but not wholly by small presses), written by Julie Schaper in 2022.
Mark Bankston Versus The Most Divorced Man In The World
As part of a defamation lawsuit against the owner of Twitter for his tweets, Mark Bankston - whom you may recall was the lawyer for the Sandy Hook families in the Texas lawsuit against Alex Jones, where he told the conspiracy theorist that he had recieved a full copy of his phone's contents from his lawyer while cross examining him - has deposed Elon Musk under oath, in a deposition that is a sight to behold. [more inside]
Smallest measure of ordinary care
Jennifer and James Crumbley, parents of Michigan school shooter, sentenced to 10 to 15 years for manslaughter "Parents are not expected to be psychic, but these convictions are not about poor parenting. These convictions confirm repeated acts, or lack of acts, that could have halted an oncoming runaway train -- about repeatedly ignoring things that would make a reasonable person feel the hair on the back of their neck" (Judge) Matthews said.
Cow Magnets
What is a cow magnet? Have you ever heard of this type of magnet? Actually, cow magnets are very popular with farmers, ranchers, and veterinarians since they are a well-known method of preventing hardware disease in cattle. So what’s hardware disease? An informational page from Stanford Magnets.
NYC Chicken Shop Replaces Cashier With Woman in Philippines On Zoom
The cashier at Sansan Chicken East Village in NYC is a woman from the Philippines who logs on via Zoom. A photo of this odd arrangement went viral on Twitter this weekend via a post by Brett Goldstein.
"A novela much bigger than their own campaigns"
Arizona's Split Reality (Olivia Nuzzi for New York, archive.is), on the trail with Senate candidates Ruben Gallego and Kari Lake
“Why do tragedies give pleasure?”
That well is classical Greek tragedy, understood as a dramatic portrayal of a character who, while navigating the inevitable contingencies of an embodied, time-bound life, is suddenly brought low by extreme suffering unrelieved by God, the gods, or any other transcendent source of meaning. The key to tragedy is the degree to which that character bears the torment without succumbing to despair. From that crucible emerges the steel of virtue. from The Character of Tragedy by [Hedgehog Review]
April 8
"Is that you John wayne, is this me"
'I’ve never seen ...The Searchers.'
"I’ve always imagined John Wayne as the epitome of gun-toting American racism. And I didn’t expect this white-supremacy parable to change my mind …" "(John) Ford is likely the best American historian when it comes to narrative filmmaking 'Printing the Legend: 'The Searchers and a journey into the heart of America’s darkness.' " Scores of film students and enthusiasts have wondered and wrote about what does this last scene of the film mean." Cinemas Greatest Scenes: The Searchers Doorway Scene. { CW: racism in film.}
Vortex rings rise from Italy's Mount Etna volcano
Vortex rings rise from Italy's Mount Etna volcano.
Mount Etna has released volcanic vortex rings, a rare phenomenon caused by a constant release of vapours and gases. [more inside]
More D&D Info Cartoons
Six years ago (really? wow) I posted about Zee Bashew's terrific D&D explainer videos. Well he's still making them, and is trying to do one a week for the next few months! Here are some he's made since I last told you all about them: What is a grognard? - Ceremony - Encumbrance in 5E - The Awful Way I Ran 5E Survival - Magic Mouth - Oops! All Wizards - 5E Players Try 1E (AD&D) - Healer Feat - The Problem With The Awaken Spell (sad/funny) - Dangers of Metagaming - Option: Quantum Inventory - Grappling in 1E. If you enjoy D&D, or just learning or watching videos about it, Zee Bashew's Channel is great.
Lost Boomer Classic "The Space Explorers" - Rediscovered after 70 years!
"The Space Explorers" was a series of animated, educational Sci-Fi shorts shown on morning kids' TV in the US, around 1961. Astronomy enthusiast Jimmy Perry stows away on the Polaris II, flying to rescue his Dad who crashed on the moon on his way to Mars, in the Polaris 1. Set in 1978, each episode had little bits of this story padded out with educational lessons about astronomy. A very few sequences from the show are available at the Internet Archive, but there's much [more inside]
A very particular and ugly recent history
When Candace Owens, the far-right political commentator, parted ways with conservative media company the Daily Wire in late March, the news unleashed something strange on the internet. Factions emerged to yell at each other about theology, censorship, and bigotry. Extremists chatted with establishment right-wingers in audio chatrooms on social media. Content creators wrote blog posts and produced YouTube videos with their take on one particular phrase: “Christ Is King.” That phrase gripped the right for days, leaving movement leaders struggling with layers of infighting that proved difficult to parse for all but the most egregiously online people. It was also, for those tracking the right’s strange coalition-building, a warning sign: The establishment conservatives’ pragmatic alliance with hateful white supremacist groups may finally be breaking under the awkwardness of having avowed antisemites in a pro-Israel movement. from The Establishment Right’s Alliance With Open Bigots Is Under a New Kind of Pressure [Slate]
You can opt out any time you like. But you can never leave.
The USENIX Association have published a Report (PDF) Analysing Cookie Notice Compliance.
We show that 56.7% of cookie notices do not include an option to opt out of consent, that more than 65.4% of websites with an opt-out option collect users’ data despite explicit negative consent, and that 73.4% of websites do so even when users do not interact with the cookie notice.
Olivia Newton-John Television Special 1978
This is a particularly interesting find -- a full television special from 1978 focussed on Olivia Newton -John called Olivia [50m]. The guest starts are Andy Gibb and ABBA! The first 33 minutes are high-quality standard fare Seventies variety show material, but the last bit of the show has six people sitting stage having a little hootenanny, improvising sing-a-longs, and we eve get to hear Frida sing in her opera voice a bit! It's entirely charming that turns transcendent at the end.
Neither a good shield nor a good shovel: The Hughes Shield Shovel
The MacAdam Shield Shovel, also known as the Hughes Shovel, was designed and patented by Sam Hughes, the Canadian minister for the Department of Militia and Defence in 1913, to be staked in the ground for alternate use as cover. It was thicker and heavier than normal spades but failed to stop even small caliber bullets. It also had a large sight hole in the shovel blade for a rifle to poke through, making it a poor shovel. In 1914, 25,000 shield-shovels were ordered and shipped to Europe for use by the 1st Canadian Division, and then later scrapped. Sam Hughes had a string of failed inventions: "Hughes equated masculinity with toughness, and argued that militia service would toughen up Canadian men who might otherwise go soft living in an urban environment full of labor-saving devices."
Lyn Hejinian, 1941-2024
Excerpts from Lyn Hejinian's My Life: "A name trimmed with colored ribbons"; "Reason looks for two, then arranges it from there"; "As for we who 'love to be astonished'"; "Yet we insist that life is full of happy chance"; "One begins as a student but becomes a friend of clouds." Lisa Samuels, "Eight justifications for canonizing Lyn Hejinian's My Life." "The Rejection of Closure," "Continuing Against Closure," and other work online. Obits: NYT (ungated / archived), Jacket2, and The Nation. Remembrances: Berkeley English, LARB, and The Paris Review. Colin Vanderburg (n+1, Apr. 5), "Tree, Chair, Cone, Dog, Bishop, Piano, Vineyard, Door, or Penny: On Lyn Hejinian": "There is no better way to end, or to begin, or to continue. The facts are finished, but the life is still open."