my beloved trans community: do you feel like you transitioned late? (whatever that means to you!) if so, I'd love to hear from you for an essay I'm working on 🙏 🐛 forms.gle/AMd8zWnWvEro...

I wish I could bottle the way my 3-year-old niece says the word dinosaur. I think it would heal a lot of people. It’s so cute, transcription doesn’t quite do it justice. It’s something like “dine-tore,” but she does a funny diphthong on syllables that end in r that I don’t know how to convey.

When I told my husband about this this morning I think he wasn't sure whether I was telling him about a dream or a real thing. "They were doing pushups in a sauna." "He was doing a cold plunge wearing jeans." "He was drinking milk in a hot tub with Kid Rock."

(I haven't read this article. Just responding to the question.) I'm excited about ebikes. I think they have the potential to replace a lot of 1-10 mile single-person car trips. I love riding a regular bike, but ebikes make it quicker & less sweaty & more accessible & let you carry more stuff.

By the always excellent Erin Davis, a chart of the first names that have seen the greatest (estimated) drop in living Americans with that name. Much more here, including an interactive to look the trends for any first name: erdavis.com/2026/02/16/i...

Even though this makes Buffett look generous, a fun fact is that if you have 100 billion dollars, you can give away 99% of your money and still have enough to spend $27,000 a day for 100 years. Giving away that much of your wealth has no impact on the comfort of your life.

Happy birthday to one of my favourite haters, Charles Darwin

Ominous bird valentines.

Onnis on inimene by Cyrillus Kreek, from what is probably my favorite album of all time. www.youtube.com/watch?v=D2iy...

Welcome to #DuboisChallenge2026 where the #dataviz community is encouraged to re-create visuals from the Paris Expo of 1900. This years theme is "Maps". This thread will introduce each image (see: github.com/ajstarks/dub...)

One of these days, people will look back on these sports betting ads like we do on the ads for patent medicines featuring cocaine.

No Kings includes Draft Kings

GM: Charisma check. Mamdani: [rolls natural 20] GM: that’s a d6 how did you Mamdani: [direct to camera] Did you know you can check out board games at your local public library? 😊

NSF GRFP applicants (and mentors): Was your application Returned Without Review and deemed ineligible despite fitting in the allowed topics? 1) Write NSF 2) Write your Congressperson 3) CC us at [email protected] so we can compile + follow up Details and template at grant-witness.us/grfp-letter

Now that some bird people have liked/reskeeted, I'm in central NJ & it had an orange and white spotted body, darker brown head, and black and white bands on the tail. It was sitting in a tree, and I didn't get a good look at it when it flew off. Maybe red-shouldered?

Sorry I'm not prepared for our meeting. I was trying to identify the hawk I just saw.

Almost 4000 people have done this quiz so far, although younger groups still under-represented in case you know anyone who'd like to give it a go and see how they compare to others! probability.kucharski.io

Haymarket Books has made three of their eBooks free for download during this time of turmoil. You can get copies of: "Unbuild Walls" by Silky Shah, "Border & Rule" by Harsha Walia, and "The Case for Open Borders" By John Washington.

Mutual Aid by Dean Spade is free on Libro for the next week (until 2/2).  We know that books can't fix everything, but they can help us show up for and strengthen our communities. Our employee book club read this last year, leading to a great discussion. We hope that it helps others do the same 💗 ⏬

Thinking of my nieces, my little cousins, my godchildren, my friends' kids, and how the natural thing for an adult to want to do is protect a child. It takes a lot of dedication to losing that instinct and working against basic humanity to do something like this. This is depravity.

I've had this piece stuck in my head all afternoon. It's the most beautiful song I know with only three notes. Listening to it feels like tapping into a reservoir of peace www.youtube.com/watch?v=6Uad...

imagine dying to death and being asked to solve math puzzles for your last words. for one man, this was no mere hypothetical

Listened to Shostakovich's first symphony today, written when he was 18-19, and dang, it's impressive how much he sounds exactly like Shostakovich from the get-go.

"We asked the doors at the Triangle Shirtwaist Factory why they didn't open, not the people who chose to lock them."

So these journalists are asking *Grok* what happened, not a spokesperson for the company that made it?! I'm just flabbergasted. Do you ask a car for a comment when it has a part recalled??? It's just beyond parody.

Here’s the end of the article. The author sets up a straw man that is very unlikely to ever occur and then says “see how reasonable this is?” What would actually happen is that people would sue because someone way more qualified but with an SAT score 10 points lower got the job over them.

“I’m 30 years old. I’ve done 10+ years of higher education culminating in original research in my field of study. I’ve taught college classes and published in academic journals.” “But how did you do on a standardized test when you were 17? I am very smart.”

Listening to the Coventry Carol today like this

One thing that absolutely definitely happens for real in the academic job market is that when you do not get a job, the Dean calls you and explains why you didn't get it. This is extra-super true when the explanation is something legally actionable on its face.

I honestly feel pretty despondent about how we've given up on even paying lip service to being against distracted driving. A lot of people texted while driving the moment texting became a thing, but it used to be socially unacceptable to admit to doing it.

It turns out we could have paid using an app, but our @nicebus.bsky.social driver didn't bother to tell us, even when we asked if there was a way to pay other than cash or Metrocard. Really unpleasant first attempt to use Nice! I would even go so far as to say it was...not Nice.

Bus indignity otd: the Long Island buses, which cost $2.90 and only run once an hour, only accept coins (not bills) and Metrocard (which is being phased out in 20 days). So after waiting for it in the cold, we couldn’t get on! Sorry we didn’t come here with 22 quarters 🙄

Well that escalated quickly. (Figure from “A survey of the theory of hypercube graphs” by Harary, Hayes, and Wu)

IIRC ~80% of Utah's water is used for agriculture, so 16% of that other 20% is ~3%. The vast majority of that is golf courses & lawns, and it's a little unclear from the article whether that kind of outdoor use is being counted. If not, then we're talking 16% of ~5%.

Yes, HID headlights are very bright but the bigger problem is the proliferation of gargantuan vehicles with 5’+ hood heights so that if you’re driving a normal sized car their headlights are at your eye level rather than seat level like they’re supposed to be.

happy trans day of remembrance. you are beautifully and wonderfully made and I will never stop fighting for you. the world is better because you are in it

There should be a reciprocal newspaper membership like with botanical gardens and art museums. If you subscribe to your local paper, you should be able to read a few articles from other local papers. I don't mind newspaper paywalls on principle, but I can't subscribe to every paper.

But still teaching?? Nauseating. Imagine being a young woman in one of his classes and having to know about the pathetic gutter misogyny he was emailing to his convicted child sex offender friend under a decade ago. Imagine being *anyone* in one of his classes and having to know that!

❤️ Love this ❤️ @mathforge.org has done what I’ve never been organised enough to do myself, and catalogued every #geometrypuzzle I’ve ever posted on social media. It looks amazing!

I can't say enough good things about @cragcrest.bsky.social's Book Proposal Boot Camp! I've been trying to get a proposal done for years, and this helped me get up to speed and actually writing. christieaschwanden.com/the-book-pro...

Third time in a row my yogurt failed. :( I've been making yogurt almost continuously for about 17 years now, and I think this is the worst run I've had. It's really shaking my confidence, in addition to wasting food and throwing off my morning routine.

It’s Fanny Mendelssohn Hensel’s 220th birthday! To celebrate, I have a new recording out of her Sonata in G Minor which you can now listen to on the streaming platform of your choice

Get to know your mutuals. List 10 random things you like: beans thrifting Shostakovich string quartets La Croix tangerine seltzer oolong tea silk scarves the smell of autumn leaves postcards biocrust quail chicks

It's exhausting to be angry all the time about egregious important things. My current outrage about something that doesn't matter at all: LeBron James plays violin. He's 6'9" with a 7-foot wingspan. Why would you waste that on a violin instead of a viola?! He could have such a rich C string sound!

My takeaway from every new Epstein revelation is that some powerful people victimized many powerless young women, many more knew, some actively enabled it--and we're still being told that MeToo and accountability for sexual violence have gone too far

My brain is short circuiting tonight over how pathetic this email is. Really got em with that "I implied women are only 50/51ths as intelligent as men" zinger. If I were the 63 yo former secretary of the treasury, I'd definitely think it was a cool & clever thing to email to my convicted pedo buddy.

Gonna tell my kids this was Cats (2019).

Listening to an Elizabethan era album today and feeling this meme deeply. (As I do often because this meme captures my very essence.)

via @xaqwg.bsky.social a good NYT article on the great Moon Duchins www.nytimes.com/2025/11/03/s... #gerrymandering

Tfw the book you’re reading cites you. 😆 Hi, @drmichaelbrooks.bsky.social, glad you liked my blog post about a silly way to draw a lute. www.scientificamerican.com/blog/roots-o...