Good god, the amount of spam coming in from bogus journals soliciting manuscripts has suddenly gone up by an order of magnitude in the last 24 hrs. SO MANY BOGUS JOURNALS TO CHOOSE FROM!

One of the great things about astronomy is international collaborations. So many people, so many timezones, the science never stops! One of the difficult things about astronomy is international collaborations. So many people, so many timezones, the emails never stop!

I'm so old that I can remember when the NFL wanted to get politics out of their broadcasts....

And these children that you spit on As they try to change their worlds Are immune to your consultations They're quite aware of what they're going through

It's like ten (fifteen?) years ago when universities were tripping all over themselves to invest in MOOCs. Who remembers MOOCs? <george costanza voice>oh no, i'm so sorry, it's MOOPS.</george costanza voice>

He's standing there like somebody unplugged his controller on the Xbox...

Somewhere in the afterlife, my Dad is watching over what happened last night, and he's clapping. And urging us to keep fighting.....

Lemme guess: SEA, LAX, SFO, IAD, EWR, JFK, ORD, but not DFW, MIA, STL, SLC.....

OMG, university admin just sent out a note requesting that faculty fill out an application form to be selected to serve on a new university service committee. Um, I think that is one application form I will not be filling out.

realized halfway through making dinner tonight that I made this same thing three nights ago, too. oh well, who doesn't like tacos?

Had some difficulty explaining orbits, rotating reference frames, and the epicyclic approximation to my Galactic astro students. The math wasn’t clicking for them, and simulations tracing trajectories were only partially successful. So… I resorted to dance! 1/5

28 years on faculty at CWRU as of today.

It always worries me just a bit when Juniorkid does the Pittsburgh to Cleveland run in just under 12 parsecs....

It really doesn't get any better than the Velvet Underground doing "Sister Ray".....

Always really happy the first day after the time change back to standard time. Nice to get light back in the morning, and have it get dark when it should.

I dunno, actually for me the Trump administration has absolutely lived up to my expectations on their handling of the cost of living....

Goodnight and Happy Halloween from our house!

I forgive people who slight my musical taste. Really, I do. But I do not forget.

Geez, the new outdoor Halloween lights I bought only lasted a week after I hung them up. Now they wont light, and it's not even Halloween yet. I WAS NOT ANGRY SINCE I CAME TO HALLOWEEN UNTIL THIS INSTANT! (with apologies to Shakespeare and Henry V)

Writing a rec letter for a student's NSF grad fellowship app. How do I write this when a) the NSF broader impact evaluation criteria specifically refer to diversity and inclusion of under-represented students, but b) any language about that gets the application auto-jettisoned into the trash.

you probably can't tell from the picture, but her claws are anchored so deeply into my skin that if I try to pull away giant strips of flesh will be torn from my hand. but she's purring, so I guess it's ok.

BRIAN KELLY TO MICHIGAN STATE!

Brian Kelly to Michigan State, you heard it here first, folks!

Since we often complain about getting bad referee reports, I thought I'd give a positive shout-out to the anonymous referee who wrote the report I just back on one of my papers. The suggestions have me rejiggering the analysis and presentation in a way that's going to make the paper better.

Just chilling in my back yard.

My main problem with 2 factor verification is that by the time I find my phone, open the app, enter the code, and go back to the login screen, so much time has passed that I've forgotten why the hell I was trying to log in in the first place....

hah, we got a "FOR GODS SAKE, FACULTY, IF THE PRESS CONTACT YOU, DONT TALK TO THEM WITHOUT TALKING TO US FIRST!!" email from university administration today.

Just asked The Google if M101 was a LINER and Google AI replied "Yes, M101 is a specific shade of MOB Beauty Cake Liner, a product designed to be used as an eyeliner." So add that to the list of M101's interesting properties.

BREAK UP THE BROWNS!!!

Wouldn't it be something if this year's college football national championship game ends up being Vanderbilt vs Indiana?

Aww, a picture from years ago, on an observing run with Jack the Great White Dog (and Paul and Cameron) at the KPNO 2m. 🔭

Thinking about that time I got an email from someone saying that their mag - surface brightness relation of m = mu * area was equally valid to what my course notes said [m = mu - 2.5log(area)], as long as we restricted the area to one square arcsecond. Really couldn't argue with them there....

It's midterms week around here (including in my class). So I cancelled class on Tue. Students asked me why, and I said "Because we're all busy enough this week." They seemed stunned.

Oh my gosh, how much do I love The Dead Weather. Can't be played loud enough.

I am *so* there for this. Who's with me?

FedEx overnight got a lot of business out of me back in the days of paper submissions.

Oh don't mind me, I'm just cramming in a crash course on AGB stars with 8.5 hours to go until the JWST deadline....

When refereeing papers, I almost never ask to see a revised version. If my comments help improve the paper, great I've done my job. If they blow off my concerns, then either a) I've made dumb comments that *should* be ignored, or b) they can publish a flawed paper. Either way, no skin off my nose.

With Spousal Unit away visiting her mom -- and both girls having flown the coop -- it's back to a bachelor pad for me for the next week. I'm trying to get the cats to chant "Toga! Toga!" but it's not working....

In honor of spooky month, share a 4 word horror story that only someone in your profession would understand: Tonight's forecast: mostly clear.

I do not find this comforting.

Scene at my house, where spouse and I are going out to the theater in a bit. Me: Get home, take a shower, get dressed. Me: Make a quick dinner. We: Eat dinner. Spouse: OK, I can clean up the dishes if you want to get cleaned up. Me: ..... Me: ..... Me: OK, then. I guess I'll go get cleaned up.

Well done, Virginia Senate democrats. This is the way.

A good time to be doing some crimes if you are white!

Fired even faster than Jean Ralphio.....

Our cats get into standoffs about exactly who has rights to the hedgehog blanket. when I sent juniorkid the first picture she sent back the second, and she's absolutely right...

logarithmic gradients (i.e., dlogx/dlogy) are some of the most useful and informative things in astronomy, and yet so many students seem deathly afraid of them.....

These two a**holes waiting for (our) dinner.

Can I get a "woot woot!"?