Even young kids can feel the difference between riding in a protected bike lane and riding without one. Our children deserve better, and we should demand more. @pbotinfo.bsky.social @bikeloudpdx.bsky.social @thestreettrust.org @bikeportland.org

Car Size xkcd.com/3167/

if you can’t see the aurora borealis tonight, here is a sewer tunnel which is a wonder in itself.

I highly recommend writing the first draft of a peer review while enjoying beverages at an airport lounge. We'll see how it translates for tomorrow's Colby, but today's Colby is completely confused by the experimental design. On a related note, the PHL Chase Sapphire lounge is excellent!

You heard it here, folks. LinkedIn says so.

Car brand BYD's new SUV ad pokes fun at people walking and cycling, comparing them to Horse & Carts. It joins a long list of car ads that sell a false promise of convenience and aspiration while punching down at sustainable transport modes. So I made it a bit more realistic...

Why is it always so tough to log into Editorial Manager to do a peer review. If journals want me to do a peer review, they should make the process as seamless as possible. I shouldn't have to track down a login that was created for me despite already having four for the same website...

I saved all productivity in my department this morning. Somebody unplugged the Bunn coffee maker because they couldn't get the burner to turn off resulting in the reservoir cooling off over night. Like, do you even coffee, bro?

YouTube music played me some Taylor Swift this morning. I gave it a thumbs down and it switched to Lazy Eye by Silversun Pickups. Good save, YouTube Music.

The US is the world's largest oil and gas producer. Yet, "China is now making more money from exporting green technology than America makes from exporting fossil fuels."

One analytical model shows that, as of November 5th, the dismantling of U.S.A.I.D. has already caused the deaths of 600,000 people, two-thirds of them children. https://newyorkermag.visitlink.me/jUzNSc

Of all the Serving Up Science episodes, this is my favorite. wkar.pbslearningmedia.org/resource/can... It’s also our least popular & least viewed. But for 7 mins, I got to talk about how amazing & essential soil really is @pbs.org. And that’s a win! 👩🏻‍🌾🪏🪴

So everyone says we were unreasonably made afraid of quicksand relative to real risk but today I literally almost died in quicksand

We have progressed from data collection to data analysis.

Halloween is the perfect example of how the time spent in or around cars are the most dangerous periods of any day for most Americans. And it is rarely acknowledged on a wide scale.

Giving students extra credit for coming to class in costume on Halloween is always a treat. They also got to learn about soil organic matter from me dressed as Han Solo. I forgot to get a picture though :(

I realize that many scientists are not confident in their art skills. Simple drawings made by scientists who may not be artistically talented are significantly better than the ai art because **the ai stuff is full of errors**. “Bad” but correct figures are better than “prettier” wrong ones.

People ask if I get cold commuting by bike through the fall and winter. It dipped below freezing during my morning commute and I currently have a fan blowing on full blast on my desk. #CommuteByBike #Cycling #Biking #WinterBiking

More people need to watch this. It's what happens when a pipeline carrying CO2 ruptures. We need these pipelines for any carbon sequestration scheme (CCS, DAC). When the flood of heavy CO2 gas rolls over the landscape it suffocates everything in its path and shuts off car engines, which need oxygen.

My wife to my kid in another room: "What are you doing?" My kid from the bathroom: "Eating a fruit roll-up." Wife: "In the bathroom?!" Never a dull moment.

Guillermo del Toro on wealth: "a wealthy man is a man who has enough, not a man that needs more. If you have enough to invite someone for a beer? You're rich. If you have a yacht, planes, islands, and you still need more? You're not rich."

Whenever people complain about the number of folks relying on food stamps, it is worth reminding them that SNAP is, by too large of a degree, a subsidy for corporations that refuse to pay a living wage and their political allies who reject public policy prescriptions to reduce income inequality.

Scary costume!

The US Bank app says I should "Manage my education spending with a smart monthly budget." It says I should budget $200 a month instead of my average spending of $257. That $257 is a student loan payment set up on auto-pay. You would think a bank would know how loans work.

Anybody have recommendations for a pocket AM/FM radio? Preferably one that can connect to Bluetooth headphones. I lost my C.Crane pocket radio that I took to football and baseball games for years. #Radio #DadLife #FM

The lengths universities go to make things difficult for student organizations boggles my mind. I'm an adviser/coach for two student groups, and the hurdles seem constant.

University administration: "We need you to complete 26 hours of lab safety training 🧪 each year so that everyone is safe and responsible." Also university administration:

We're watching a classic in my introductory soil science lab this week. #Soil #Water

Distressed to see I guess I'm out of a job. AI has figured out everything there is to know about maize domestication. (Found this online when looking for images for a talk)

Said every #BikeCommuter ever.

In honor of spooky month, share a 4 word horror story that only someone in your profession would understand: Sampled by depth increments

I encountered a fungus puffball today during the #Agron635 Soil and Water Conservation class. All the students were busy doing infiltration measurements with mini disk infiltrometers across our site, so I had to record a video for them. #fungi #soil

This! I am a sustaining member of my local NPR and PBS stations, a subscriber to my local newspaper, and a few other groups that do excellent journalism (e.g. Wired for their reporting in Doge).

Every mention of Beri Weiss in the news makes me think of this beer first, and I want to keep it that way. It's not a great beer, but it's better than the news. #BeriWeiss #BerryWeiss #Leinenkugels

Wheel of Fortune, welcome to the War on Cars

I've been playing LinkedIn's games lately, especially "Zip". It's weird that it compares your performance and says stuff like "you're smarter than 75% of CEOs". I could see why LinkedIn would be biased, but I don't think we as a civilization should hold CEOs as the standard bearers of intelligence.

My attitude is salty today. Perfect timing to get an email from Pearson about textbooks for my classes so I can reply and tell them why they're terrible!

Imagine if NPR had actually talked to safe streets advocates for this story and learned how the solutions to drivers killing people is not, in fact, victim blaming

Cell phone use by drivers should carry the same penalties as driving while intoxicated since the reaction time of using a phone or being under the influence is the same.

“I use it for brainstorming.” is quickly becoming my most hated pro-AI statement. YOU TOOK YOUR BRAIN OUT OF THE EQUATION. THAT IS NOT BRAINSTORMING.

Rick Dees and the Weekly Top 40

The r/soil subreddit has a crazy number of posts of people using a jar test to determine what their soil texture is. I wonder why laypeople go with that test instead of just doing texture by feel. It's not difficult. I don't get it.

My kid told his mom, "If Dad can bike to work in the rain then I can bike to school in the rain." #ProudDad #CommuteByBike

The Kansas Forest Service (not on Bluesky) has a calery pear (Bradford pear) buyback event on Oct. 4. See details from their email below. Their callery website is www.kansasforests.org/forest_healt...

So, this just came up in conversation again, so it bears saying publicly: AI companies are touting their software's utility for proofreading. COPY EDITING IS MORE THAN JUST PROOFREADING! Copy editors also check for continuity errors, consistency, style guide conformity, and formatting errors.

My kid's piano teacher: "What does that symbol mean?" My kid: "Hashtag!"

I followed a Bobcat skid loader while commuting on my @surlybikes.bsky.social Skid Loader this morning. #CommuteByBike

Looked at my data collections for state-backed activity. If the report were a picture:

Just another annoying broadcast for K-State fans...

You know what happens when you don’t have a faculty senate? In a crisis, there is no one to ask questions — even to give illusion of holding anyone responsible — so misinformation spreads like wildfire among faculty & students, admin aren’t believed, and no one else has authority to clarify facts.