April 2, 2020
Which character are you?
This personality test from the Open-Source Psychometrics Project will rate your similarity to over 400 fictional characters, out of works ranging from Parks and Recreation to Pride and Prejudice. [more inside]
COVID-19 projections for hospital resource usage
COVID-19 projections for the US, state by state The Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation from the University of Washington has offered this tool to help hospitals predict what resource usage will be like over the next few weeks. Numbers are updated daily.
This post has no dreams.
Ten Rules from a Reader (of Crime and Mystery Fiction) "1. No dreams, please. Supposedly it was Henry James who first said: “Tell a dream, lose a reader.” Billy Collins once wrote a poem called “On Reading In The Morning Paper That Dreams May Be Only Nonsense.” “You hit the pillow and moments later,” he wrote, “your mother appears to you as a llama, shouting at you in another language.” ... There may be people whose dreams provide brilliant insights into their character or provide clever solutions to problems that eluded them during their waking hours. But I’ve never met anyone like that. Any time a friend of mine begins recalling a dream for me, I begin mentally scrolling through my Netflix queue trying to decide what I’ll watch on TV after dinner.... [more inside]
smoke-filled rooms
Over the last two years, the Trump administration has sought to undo Obama-era car and truck tailpipe emission regulations, basing their argument on a flawed analysis of U.S. automobile fuel economy standards and 'phantom vehicle miles traveled [VMT]'[PDF].
Gutting fuel economy standards during a pandemic is peak Trump, but then so too is Going Full 'Shock Doctrine' by indefinitely suspending some pollution laws even though air pollution makes respiratory diseases like COVID-19 more dangerous (see Kurt, Zhang and Pinkerton 2016)
Gutting fuel economy standards during a pandemic is peak Trump, but then so too is Going Full 'Shock Doctrine' by indefinitely suspending some pollution laws even though air pollution makes respiratory diseases like COVID-19 more dangerous (see Kurt, Zhang and Pinkerton 2016)
If I Wrote a Coronavirus Episode
Tina Fey, Mike Schur, and 35 more TV writers on what their characters would do in a pandemic. Vulture posed the question to dozens of showrunners, creators, and writers; 37 of them responded with scene scripts, monologues, and episode outlines, including a hilarious Skype session between Frasier and Niles, a classic locker-room speech from Coach Taylor, an excerpt from Selina Meyer’s biography, and a vlog for Rogelio De La Vega’s biggest fans.
Dr. Bonnie Henry: (virtual) holder of hands for the Canadian public
[I]n the midst of the coronavirus pandemic, Dr. Bonnie Henry, British Columbia’s soft-spoken provincial health officer, has become beloved in households across the country. Each day as she addresses the province at 3 p.m. local with the latest data and policy plan – later beamed across the nation in evening broadcasts – she’s become a holder of hands for the Canadian public. The Dr. Bonnie Henry Fan Club, a fan-curated list of kind words and links about Dr. Henry. "Dear Dr. Bonnie," a tribute song by two Vancouver fans, set to the tune of Hamilton's "Dear Theodosia." Juno Award-winning jazz musician Phil Dwyer's "The Ballad of Bonnie Henry." [more inside]
THERE IS NEVER A SHORTAGE OF YEAST
"Frumpy yeast geneticist" Sudeep Agarwala explains how to make your own yeast. More about Dr. Agarwala here. Original Twitter thread here.
Self-isolating with rescue ducks
Blaze a rainbow path across everything in sight 🌈
Magical Rainbow Sponge (SLYT)
Things fall apart
Cristina Monet-Palaci could be described as the First Lady of ZE Records. Her chirpy, sinister single "Disco Clone" was the first the label released. She gained infamy for her updated cover of "Is That All There Is", which Leiber and Stoller forced the label to withdraw (though it came out through other means).
After releasing two albums, Doll in the Box and Sleep It Off, she married ZE owner Michael Zilkha, and kept a low profile as the "Madame Bovary of the freeway." Though she spoke of recording another album, her only post-1982 recording is DJ Ursula's single "Urgent, Anxious".
Cristina died on 2 April 2020 from complications of the coronavirus. [more inside]
It is independent of the fickleness of fortune
Rome Didn’t Fall In A Day
“ The popular story version of this particular falling empire might focus on a twice-divorced serial philanderer and bullshit artist and make him the villain, rendering his downfall or ultimate triumph the climax of the narrative. But it’s far more likely that the real meat of the issue will be found in a tax code full of sweetheart deals for the ultra-wealthy, the slashed budgets of county public health offices, the lead-contaminated water supplies. And that’s to say nothing of the decades of pointless, self-perpetuating, and almost undiscussed imperial wars that produce no victories but plenty of expenditures in blood and treasure, and a great deal of justified ill will.” How Do You Know If You’re Living Through the Death of an Empire? (Mother Jones) Patrick Wyman, host of the Tides of History and The Fall of Rome Podcast, goes on Trashfuture to discuss late antiquity, measuring imperial fall by letter circulation, western senatorial families as multi-national corporations, and possible future political organizations. (1:17:00)
A detailed taxonomy of wacky elephant drawings
Elephas Anthropogenus After the fall of the Roman Empire, elephants virtually disappeared from Western Europe.
Since there was no real knowledge of how this animal actually looked, illustrators had to rely on oral and written transmissions to morphologically reconstruct the elephant, thus reinventing an actual existing creature. This tree diagram traces the evolution of the elephant depiction throughout the middle ages up to the age of enlightenment.
Alright, say it. These videos are down-right screwy.
CONCATENATION, an experimental video by Donato Sansone, with sound and music by Enrico Ascoli (1 minute, composed of stock video clips, assembled in a Rube Goldberg type video, with implied violence). Not familiar with Goldberg? Here, he'll show you how to get Something for Nothing (previously). See also: 787 Cliparts by Oliver Laric, a short, silent animation. [Videos 1 & 3 from Kottke]
“The Four”
Four Of The World's Best Zelda: Breath Of The Wild Players Create Epic Gameplay Montage [YouTube][Cinematic Combat Montage] “RinHara5aki, Kleric, CHC Yu-Da, and Peco are, on their own, some of the most technically impressive The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild players on the planet — their videos showcasing advanced and obscure combat methods have accrued millions of views on YouTube. The four of them getting together for a single video is almost too much to handle. “The Four” is a combat montage that is the result of four months of work, and it is meant as a last hurrah for Breath of the Wild. With a sequel on the way, group leader RinHara5aki thought it would be a good idea to make a love letter to the game before saying goodbye.” [via: Polygon]
Crowdsourced list of companies and their hiring status
Amazing crowdsourced list of companies and their current hiring status This live, editable and growing Airtable file detailing which companies have layoffs, hiring freezes or are still actively recruiting is fascinating and might be a terrific resource for those of us who have had a job loss due to the economic impact of Covid-19. Also, scroll down for impact by business sector.
Nobody was hurt.
L'Orchestre national de France Plays "Bolero"
Yes, THAT Betty Boop
Mr. Boop: a new daily comic strip [Alec Robbins] invented about what it’s like being married to Betty Boop (slTwitter); also on Thread reader. [more inside]
If you ever come back to Hackensack
Stockholm, Are You Listening?
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