Capybaras and leather straps

So I was telling someone that in 2020, I’m voting for whatever <my preferred political party> nominates as long as it breaths air and has an internal skeleton. So no fish or insects, but a capybara yes.

It’s amazing how many people do not know what a capybara is.

So I was depressed and it reminded me of Emo Philips’ line, “Some mornings, it’s just not worth chewing through the leather straps.”

More Philips funnies: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9nX_EaFBTPE.

All right, capybaras: images and Wikipedia. And a photo article in The Atlantic (so cute!).

(Capybaras also interest me for another reason. Despite their being covered with fur, air-breathing, and bearing their young live, the Catholic Church apparently declared them to be a fish and thus edible during Lent, because they spend a lot of time in the water.)

Corporate ADHD

Or, why I keep everything on my own machine, plus two backups (one in a fireproof box):

It’s only April, and 2019 has already been an absolutely brutal year for Google’s product portfolio. The Chromecast Audio was discontinued January 11. YouTube annotations were removed and deleted January 15. Google Fiber packed up and left a Fiber city on February 8. Android Things dropped IoT support on February 13. Google’s laptop and tablet division was reportedly slashed on March 12. Google Allo shut down on March 13. The “Spotlight Stories” VR studio closed its doors on March 14. The goo.gl URL shortener was cut off from new users on March 30. Gmail’s IFTTT support stopped working March 31.

And today, April 2, we’re having a Google Funeral double-header: both Google+ (for consumers) and Google Inbox are being laid to rest. Later this year, Google Hangouts “Classic” will start to wind down, and somehow also scheduled for 2019 is Google Music’s “migration” to YouTube Music, with the Google service being put on death row sometime afterward.

https://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2019/04/googles-constant-product-shutdowns-are-damaging-its-brand/

The day the dinosaurs died

Sixty-six million years ago, a giant meteor slammed into Earth off the coast of modern-day Mexico. Firestorms incinerated the landscape for miles around. Even creatures thousands of miles away were doomed on that fateful day, if not by fire and brimstone, then by mega-earthquakes and waves of unimaginable size.

Now, scientists have unearthed a remarkable trove of fossils that appear to date from the very day of the impact…

SR-71 Blackbird

This is an old story about an amazing piece of technology:

There were a lot of things we couldn’t do in an SR-71, but we were the fastest guys on the block and loved reminding our fellow aviators of this fact. People often asked us if, because of this fact, it was fun to fly the jet. Fun would not be the first word I would use to describe flying this plane. Intense, maybe. Even cerebral. But there was one day in our Sled experience when we would have to say that it was pure fun to be the fastest guys out there, at least for a moment…

https://oppositelock.kinja.com/favorite-sr-71-story-1079127041

Comparing hospitals

Check this website to directly compare up to three local hospitals in 28 areas, for example “MRSA Infections.” Each measurement is explained clearly; for MRSA Infections:

Leapfrog uses a standardized infection ratio (SIR) calculated by the CDC’s National Healthcare Safety Network (NHSN) to compare the number of infections that actually happened at this hospital to the number of infections expected for this hospital, given various facility factors. A number lower than one means fewer infections than expected; a number more than one means more infections than expected.

http://www.leapfroggroup.org/compare-hospitals

Nootropics overview 2019

Chemicals to improve brain function. This article is a decent layperson’s overview. Short version: currently unregulated, poorly researched, and possible severe side effects… “But with greater scientific advancement bringing us newer and more profound ways to improve our consciousness, a future of superhumans hopped up on nootropics seems increasingly likely.”

https://www.newsweek.com/nootropics-smart-drugs-biohacking-1316682

Discovery

“My battery is low and it’s getting dark.”

https://m.dailykos.com/stories/2019/2/14/1834859/-The-most-beautiful-thing-I-have-ever-read-on-reddit-Thank-you-eleanorbartlet

“the robots can say, when they made us, they called us discovery; they called us curiosity; they called us explorer; they called us spirit. they must have thought that was important.

“and they told us to tell you hello.”

Some of the comments are also good.