Linking Park

Recommend Me a Book is an interesting way to select a book to read by sampling just the first page. I don’t know why they didn’t call it Ishmael.

I am slowly considering Glass as my primary photo-sharing site (wonder what happened to Bokeh?), but this essay -Instagram v Glass – is a good insight to why.

Something that has caused our world to literally grind to a halt and disrupted our lives for 2+ years is so small that it would fit in a can of cola.

The cultural appropriation continues unabated, with black people still being stolen from as Black English is being misidentified as internet slang.

Depression, anxiety may escalate chances of long COVID. Dare I blame my mom’s COVID infection in early January of this year for her unexpected death in September.

Talking about comorbidities that could make your COVID worse, scientists have discovered more than 50 long-term effects of COVID-19 in a systematic review and meta-analysis. Nope, you cannot just get it over with.

Who among us doesn’t remember carrying around a stack of these and then having one of them go corrupt, thus taking your entire project with it? And now there’s just one last person left standing in the floppy disk business.

When can we truly wirelessly charge our phones? Perhaps soon (or never) coz researchers just wirelessly transmitted power over 98 feet of thin air

America is great at making everything into a tourist trap. Even pain and grief. I wonder how 9/11 survivors and the families of the ones lost feel about New York's hottest tourist attraction.

Finally, academia may be waking up to the realization that we ought to reward research for being useful — not just flashy.

Discuss...

Inside the IRS ‘Pipeline’ used to process tax returns. The one featured is in Austin, and I've driven by it several times. It's a vast structure that may cover several football fields (a popular measuring unit in the U.S.)

This Map Lets You Plug in Your Address to See How It's Changed Over the Past 750 Million Years Plug in your city and you may realize you had a beachfront property albeit long ago.

Google Fiber was stalled for years but now says it’ll expand to 5 new states. It's waking up so you may benefit from the speeds that we in Austin have been enjoying for the last four years.

Moving from 1Password to iCloud Keychain. I have used 1P forever and can't imagine doing without it, but this seems doable considering I'm already bought into the Apple ecosystem.

Emoji Kitchen Browser. If you thought we had too many emojis, now imagine if you could mix and match any two of them.

I swear we in Austin thought we were cursed when the rain seemed to literally stop at the city limits, but it turns out we're just weird. University of Texas study finds cities are having an effect on the weather; preventing rain.

Discuss...

Paul Stamatiou's Photo Site. Custom-built in Jekyll. Way beyond what I can do on my own. I love his photo essay format, though.

Why Are There No Rural Superheroes There couldn't be a Spider-man in Marfa, Texas?

Personal Knowledge Management is Bullshit. Is it, though?

Chinese Scientists Show Off Laser That Can Write Words in Mid-Air. The next Chinese Bond villain is going to be lit...literally.

Scientists identify hair loss regulator protein, which could be reversible. Nothing for me here but most of you out there can hope.

The day India moved on from its national sport – field hockey to cricket via The Switch. All it took was a whitewash from an archrival.

Only a country as complacent as the UK could give up its border privilege so easily

On window seat photography. If you must do it, do it properly, but Doc Searls assumes we all sit in premier coach (front of the wing).

Discuss...

A 30-minute class can improve teenagers’ stress response, study finds.

Reframing erroneous beliefs alleviates the emotional upheavals that beset young people on the cusp of adulthood.

Export/convert Box Notes to HTML, Markdown or Plain Text. Something I hope to do for a work project that I misguidedly started in a Box Note

Sir Mo Farah reveals he was trafficked to the UK as a child 😱 I hope this makes the UK take a closer look at its human trafficking crisis.

Guest WiFi using a QR code. A better way to share your WiFi details.

By 2026, the Gates Foundation aims to spend $9 billion a year. I hope our Institute gets some of that.

How to find, read and organize papers. Get started on creating a mindful system for reading.

Nobody wants to be in the office on Fridays.

Discuss...

Democrats must stop promoting Republican extremists I guess Democrats are also to blame for Republicans voting for the crazy Republicans 🙄

Stuttering Stems from Problems in Brain Wiring, Not Personalities. Yup! We are not nervous, scared, anxious, or at a loss of words. Talking slowly or breathing in deeply doesn't help either. It's like asking a deaf person to listen carefully.

Justice Thomas cites debunked claim that Covid vaccines are made with cells from 'aborted children'. This guy might be the most dangerous influential guy in the country today. Unfortunately, he's only 74 years old. Here's hoping he has an unhealthy diet.

No wonder confidence in U.S. Supreme Court sinks to historic low.

Improving Morale Using Paloma Medina's BICEPS Framework and a Colorful Spreadsheet. I am going to try it for my direct reports next quarter.

When gasoline prices go up, it's all over the news, when the price of gasoline goes down, crickets.

...says, Kevin Drum. Journalism is now a business, so anything they report is linked to what will sell. We can't change that, but we can be aware.

Sri Lanka faces a 'man-made' food crisis as farmers stop planting. Just a reminder that organic farming is great for your backyard but can't be scaled up for feeding millions.

Discuss...

As part of my mental health evaluations, I was introduced to this technique called heart-focused breathing. It's research-backed and has shown to have advantageous effects on your health.

Post-pandemic, getting our kids back on track has dominated all education-related discussions in policy and academic circles. Ron Berger at EL Education shares some secrets from the mindset research world.

A few years ago, during a Sunday run, I was discussing education with my running group, the Coffee Cake Club. One of my buddies, who is Black, twisted his head back and said, “Well, there's only one thing that matters about a teacher.” I was taken aback. “Really? Just one thing?” He shrugged as if it were obvious and responded: “That they believe in you.

If you have missed hanging out at your favorite bar and want to recreate the audio sensory memories at least, look no further than I Miss My Bar. You can even play an accompanying curated playlist that updates every week.

Even Vanguard, the default option for traditionalist risk-averse investors is venturing into robo-investing. A minimum of $3,000 to get started and charges 0.15% annually. I've been using Betterment since 2012 and am very happy with their services, so not yet sure if I'll try out Vanguard.

Discuss...

This state park in upstate New York is bigger than Death Valley and Yellowstone combined! But nearly 52% of the land is privately-owned. Nevertheless, the remaining remains accessible and looks spectacular.

One of the most comprehensive descriptions of a home workspace I have read. It helps that it also looks so darn beautiful (h/t: Khaled).

I can forgive Amazon's many sins, but if they come for the public library, it's personal.

I'm a sucker for organizational systems, so this new one – Johnny Decimal – is intriguing. Unless I've my own business, I don't think I can use it at work, but I'll be trying it out for my personal archives (h/t: Jack).

Discuss...

The $1.9 trillion stimulus package, the largest ever in history, was passed by the Senate last Saturday. Favoring individuals over businesses, “economists estimate it will boost growth this year to the highest level in decades and reduce the number of Americans living in poverty by a third.”

Vaccination in the U.S. is ramping up with nearly 2.9m doses administered last Saturday with the 7-day rolling average now staying consistently above 2m doses a day. At this rate, we should cover 75% of the population with a two-dose vaccine within 6 months, i.e., the end of summer.

Apple has discontinued the iMac Pro and is currently selling them as “until supplies last.” Coincidentally, the professor I work with just ordered one a couple of weeks ago. Apple is recommending the regular iMac with upgrades.

Following up with people to get the data/information I need is an important part of my job. But I, too, have struggled to try to find different ways of saying, “I'm checking in about my previous email”, especially during pandemic times when I know everyone is stressed. This is a useful article on how to do a better job of following up without pissing off people.

A team of researchers suggests that one way to convince teenagers to eat healthier is to tap into their spirit of social justice and rebellion.

On the (non) existence of a middle class in India and how the myth of its size was perpetuated. Spoiler alert – we can thank the British for it. If you rank Indians by income, only 2% would fall under middle income. And you thought income disparity was a problem in your country.

Discuss...

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