I’ve now talked to IT about this and submitted some sort of business process improvement request about “please let me turn this off”

This discussion was a damn delight. And I’m gonna make my (non-academic, non-tech) book group read this soon.

IF YOU BUILD A BIKE LANE THAT DOESN'T CONNECT TO ANOTHER BIKE LANE THEN YOU DIDN'T BUILD A BIKE LANE

Tomorrow!

Haha. just kidding. apparently I'm not ALLOWED to use Thunderbird without some sort of admin approval related to my organizational email (not my computer) So I guess I'll just continue to feed my content into MS and fight their inane autocomplete and manually turn CoPilot off every few days/weeks.

I am about to switch from Outlook (where there are some built in functionalities to other softwares and systems) to Thunderbird for my university email stuff simply because CoPilot keeps turning itself on. No means NO, Microsoft.

Give every repentant Trump supporter a My Name is Earl todo list and maybe we've got something.

I remember blocking someone here because they quoted my woodfire post and talked about how we need to stop doing little hobbies because of their carbon footprint, meanwhile Meta is getting approval from my state to build 10 gas power plants for one useless data center www.nola.com/news/environ...

“The result of Friday's ruling in Chevron USA Inc. v. Plaquemines Parish is that the $745 million verdict in a 2025 state-court trial may be thrown out and the case retried in federal court. It also sets off what could be years of new jurisdictional fighting over where the other cases belong.”

‘The rain was black’: A plant explosion set off a toxic bomb in this Louisiana town I speak w/ residents of Roseland, LA, about the nightmare they’ve been living in ever since the massive explosion & chemical fire at Smitty’s Supply in their backyard @therealnews.com therealnews.com/the-rain-was...

That sound you hear are historians of science, gender, STS etc collectively banging their heads against the nearest hard surface until sweet sweet oblivion

The result of two years of investigation, "Expecting Inequity" exposes structural inequities within the healthcare system that are inescapable no matter your income or wealth.

This would rake in some cash for New Orleans as well, we have plenty of usually empty vacation homes that should be taxed more.

What would it look like for hiring + promotion/tenure to explicitly value (and signal that they value) components of academic work that are NOT publishing papers? We welcome applicants who engage in public scholarship who create software and artifacts who have strong editorial experience ... etc.

New from me today: Illinois is the destination for nearly 1 in 4 people traveling to another state for abortion care. That’s partly because of its geography, but Illinois also put in place new policies — along with millions of dollars — to welcome patients who aren’t their residents.

We don’t usually root for the Dawgs but Vance is taking yet another L in Georgia and we are here for it

“But why would you drink with him if you thought he was a creep?” Because creepy men are still powerful people in their fields. Because they are still the professional & social contacts we are forced to maintain. Because the same people tell us we’re crazy for thinking a man is creepy to begin with.

Started listening to this episode and then realized that I need to listen to it as I go for a long-ish run later this week. So my true engagement is TBD, but I love @hborenstein.bsky.social ‘s writing on this topic and am excited to have her in my headphones and talking about her research soon.

Excellent new special Issue on the challenges raised by the ancient DNA of kinship Special Issue: Kinship Trouble: Traversing Interdisciplinary Boundaries between Archaeology, Archaeogenetics and Socio-cultural Anthropology www.cambridge.org/core/journal...

Honestly until someone responds to inquiries about why the grad student I mentor had hers returned without review, I’m gonna need some more details about who and what are being funded than this article provides.

I want this for the Mississippi River. It’s a big ask and a lot of work, but people should be able to safely enjoy the Lower Mississippi. We could do more than build chemical factories and refineries and just shove freight up and down it.

This weekend I gave a presentation to a group of mostly college-aged folks and had a little line at the beginning of my slides that described it as an "AI-free presentation made by a human, for humans" and I had to pause for clapping at that part you love to see it

When I was a child, the teacher sat me next to the disruptive boy in 3rd? grade. Until one day he wouldn't get off my desk (sprawled on it). I poked him with my pencil and he slapped my face during class. I don't remember what happened after that, but I don't think I had to sit next to him anymore.

Now, you might say, "What about all the knowledge we'd lose if we push all the abusive geniuses out of academia?!" But I'd counter and say, "Well, what about the knowledge we've already lost from the budding scholars whose careers they've derailed with their abuse?"

So much of "gifted kid burnout" is due to students who did fine with easier material now struggling because that didn't adequately teach them soft skills like studying and time management. Setting/keeping a strict deadline isn't often enough to teach students these skills. We must actually teach.

"it sucks that upper-level students don't have basic student soft skills" sure. It sucks that U.S. education systems fail students in a lot of ways. I teach a lot of computer skills now that I learned in middle school computer classes (which no longer exist). I'd prefer not to have to, but alas

As some of you may know... we're down $5m and may or may not ever claw any of it back. So, we're writing new grants. If anyone would be willing to share a funded application for - NSF CAREER or NIH DP2 that is 100% dry lab-based - NSF BIO Capacity: Infrastructure I will owe you a coffee forever!

Propublica was on Clarence Thomas ass a few years ago bruh 😭 That mothafucka could’ve gotten a snicker out a vending machine and they would’ve somehow found a receipt for it.

If I was management of one of the top investigative outlets in the country I’d just simply give them what they want.

Lundberg Rice is recalled: 260201; February 1, 2027 260202; February 2, 2027 Please look at websites for more information but most websites make you scroll while they talk about RICE RECALL. www.delish.com/food-news/a7...

Those four #Artemis astronauts went from weightlessness to a 3+G re-entry to splashdown and now they’ve been at 1G bobbing in the ocean for half an hour while they wait to get pulled out of their little tin can. I do not envy how their stomachs must be feeling right now. 😬

Yesterday in my menstruation class students asked about the experience of menstruating in space, and I honestly don’t know, so please send me any info you have about SOPs or experiences or whatnot.

SPLASHDOWN!

As far as I know there is literally no reason for this, it is just an incredibly lucky coincidence that we get to enjoy for free

Super important podcast episode about a PFAS settlement for tribes. The deadline to get water tested to be a part of the settlement is soon. Water testing by a qualified group has to be done by July 1. creators.spotify.com/pod/profile/... 7 ⭐ website: sevenstarbusiness.com/tribalpfas/

For all the big problems and minor annoyances of academia, I just wanna say...So many of my students are awesome and amazing and thoughtful and I friggin love them fiercely and I want to fight for a future that lets them flourish. That is all.

Two things we can do to stop the next pandemic: 1️⃣ Reduce wildlife trade.* (👉 *But: criminalization drives trade underground, and we find that illegal trade accelerates spillover. We need new ideas.) 2️⃣ Ramp up disease surveillance in wildlife markets, farms, and supply chains.

If you're on signal & haven't already, maybe go to Settings → Notifications → Content → Name Only or No Name or Content Because apparently phone forensics can scrape msgs from notifications storage. Not just a signal problem, btw. Any encrypted messaging service w/ a "msg preview" type of setting

Like most Nobel winners, Claudia Goldin was inundated with media requests and people asking for her expertise after receiving her prize. Advising the WNBA union was one of the requests she accepted — and Goldin insisted on doing it for free. https://bit.ly/4dfGdJg

Pretty much why this is happening

A sprawling liquified natural gas facility under construction near Lake Charles is projected to produce substantially more emissions — eclipsing every LNG export terminal built in the United States so far. https://ow.ly/MxAP50YFKIV

all these universities kept axing medieval history departments as if they thought tyrants beefing with the Pope was going to stop being relevant

I was invited to give a campus-wide keynote at a flagship university for Sexual Assault Awareness Month. I was offered a speaker’s fee of $150 and parking validation. These schools really let us know their values based on where they spend their money.

Enormously looking forward to this event on April 21 at 6:30pm ET (online!) with the amazing @emilymbender.bsky.social and @alexhanna.bsky.social talking about their new book, The AI Con. Register here: virginia.zoom.us/webinar/regi...

“In an environment where the battle for American supremacy in the Cold War was being fought on all fronts—military, technological, engineering, and ideological—these men sought to gain favor and funding in the eyes of a defense apparatus trying to edge out the Soviets.” lithub.com/on-the-very-...

Please support our union’s work toward a fair contract by NOT crossing our digital picket line! That means not visiting @ProPublica.org today, April 8. (And please resume your support of @ProPublica.org all other days, we love the journalism we do!)

I have a friend who is spending her current unemployment 1) applying for jobs; and 2) watching movies that functioned as someone’s bisexual or queer awakening (millennial era preference) So please send me your recs and I will forward.

I know the world is kinda shit, but as a brief glimmer of good, I recommended my book group read The Intermediaries and The Framed Women of Ardemore House by @bschillace.brandyschillace.com and they 1) thought it was infuriating how history repeats; & 2) already decided to read the follow-up novel.

Happy to see public health folks and community organizers starting to work together on this issue. Lead is a community problem, not one that individuals can effectively remediate...especially given our recent dry and dusty summers.

Without alt text, seriously? It's only for sighted people?