Recommended Reading
from Bruce
Convicted for leaving water for migrants in the desert: This is Trump's justice (Washington Post Editorial)
A FEW weeks ago, federal prosecutors in Arizona secured a conviction against four humanitarian aid workers who left water in the desert for migrants who might otherwise die of heat exposure and thirst. Separately, they dropped manslaughter charges against a U.S. Border Patrol agent who fired 16 times across the border, killing a teenage Mexican boy. The aid workers face a fine and up to six months in jail. The Border Patrol officer faces no further legal consequences. That is a snapshot of twisted frontier justice in the age of Trump. Save a migrant's life, and you risk becoming a political prisoner. Kill a Mexican teenager, and you walk free.
Adam Wears: 5 Shocking Family Secrets Trump Doesn't Want You To Know (Cracked)
5. Trump Owes His Entire Fortune to His Father
Joe Bob Briggs: I Decide Who Gets Into College (Taki's Magazine)
And [in my system] racism is impossible because we never see race. What a utopian I am. What a dreamer. I must be full of old white-guy privilege. Otherwise why would I be saying every student should be treated fairly and equally? That idea is so 1776. Get over it, Joe Bob.
Adrienne LaFrance: "Russell Baker: 'When Writing Is Fun, It's Not Very Good'" (Atlantic)
Falling potatoes, reading lists, and humor critiques: a wide-ranging conversation with the legendary New York Times columnist, who died this week at 93.
Reddit, run (TLS)
Carl Miller on the creation, and squabbling continuation, of one of the most popular websites in the world.
Todd VanDerWerff: The Lego Movie 2 is perfectly fine (Vox)
Everything's not awesome in a movie that follows the assembly instructions for a movie sequel to the letter.
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Presenting
Michael Egan
said:
has returned to semi-retired status.
In memory.
Reader Suggestion
Michelle in AZ
from Bruce
Anecdotes - Clothes
• Ruggero Leoncavallo, composer of Pagliacci, once was asked by Emperor Wilhelm II of Germany to compose an opera. He composed Der Roland von Berlin, and he went to the German court to deliver the score. Because the Kaiser was busy, Mr. Leoncavallo was asked to wait with a number of other people, all of whom were wearing full-dress military uniforms, while he was wearing his usual somber black clothing. Of course, he stood out, and many chamberlains who saw him and thought that he did not belong in the company of those officers asked if he was supposed to be there. Mr. Leoncavallo said, "I found in the end that it saved time to keep my invitation card constantly in my hand, as no sooner had I put it back in than I had to take it out again to satisfy some other bespangled official that the right place for me was not the servants' hall." Of course, this was annoying, but soon Mr. Leoncavallo got satisfaction. The Kaiser arrived, complimented his score, and invited him to lunch. Mr. Leoncavallo says about the officials, "As soon as the Kaiser had gone, they all crowded around me smiling, smirking, scraping, bowing, as if I had suddenly become a second God the Father Almighty."
• Lucille Ball was the star of I Love Lucy, but co-star Vivian Vance was perhaps the funniest one off-screen. Tallulah Bankhead once guested on the show, and when Lucy said that she liked the sweater that Tallulah was wearing, Tallulah insisted on giving it to her, although Lucy pointed out that I Love Lucy was No. 1 in the ratings, and so she could afford to buy her own sweater. Vivian watched with interest as Tallulah insisted that Lucy take the sweater that she said she liked, and then Vivian said, "Tallulah, I love those pants." By the way, Vivian had to gain weight in order to appear on I Love Lucy because Lucy, a former glamor model, wanted to be the prettiest one in the show. Lucy would call her up once a year and say, "Viv, dear, we start shooting in a couple of weeks. Start eating!"
• At a show in London, Roy Stride, lead singer of Scouting for Girls, sang the song "1+1=3," which is about an unplanned pregnancy. The lyrics include the line "Take off your clothes and come to bed," and when he sang the line, six males in the balcony stripped off their clothing and flung it onto the stage. Mr. Stride says, "I was nearly knocked out by a shoe." He adds, "When I wrote the song, I honestly never considered fans would take the lyrics literally. Greg [Churchouse], our guitarist, says he suspected there might be some stripping. He blames me for being confronted by six bare male butts when he walked into our dressing room after the show. I was just glad the guys had come to collect their clothes. I was worried they'd go home naked."
• On Groucho Marx' You Bet Your Life TV quiz show, some of the guests were as entertaining as Groucho. For example, the Reverend James Whitcomb Broughter, a Baptist minister, told about getting dressed for a benefit. He had trouble tying his bowtie, so when the man who was going to take him to the banquet room showed up, he asked him if he knew how to tie it. The man did know, and he asked Reverend Broughter to lie down on the bed and then he tied the bowtie. Reverend Broughter asked, "Why did you make me lie down on the bed?" The man replied, "That's the only way I can do it. I'm an undertaker."
• Enrico Caruso and Frances Alda met on a ferryboat to travel together to and make some recordings in Camden, New Jersey. It was a rainy day, and Mr. Caruso pointed out to Ms. Alda, "You have no rubbers [rainy-day footwear] on." Ms. Alda replied, "I don't like to wear rubbers. I have pretty feet, and I'm proud of them. I'm a woman." Mr. Caruso was still worried about her, and once they were in Camden, he took Ms. Alda to the best shoe store there and had the employees bring a large assortment of rainy-day footwear until Ms. Alda found a pair she liked. Only then did they make the recordings.
• English fans of punk rockers sometimes engaged in gobbing-spitting on punk rockers as they performed. Supposedly this was a compliment, although as you would expect often the punk rockers did not like it. English singer Honey Bane once performed a concert wearing a raincoat and holding an umbrella. After her performance, the raincoat and umbrella were drenched with saliva, but she was dry when she took off the protective clothing.
• One of Pierre-Auguste Renoir's masterpieces is the painting Madam Charpentier and Her Children. He dined often with the Charpentier family and even called himself the Charpentiers' "artist-in-waiting." Once, he showed up to dine but had forgotten to wear a jacket, which was the conventional clothing of the time. So that Mr. Renoir would not feel embarrassed, Georges Charpentier had the other male guests take off their jackets.
• People should be able to wear pretty much whatever they want to, as long as the clothing covers the essentials, but other people can be judgmental. Ani DiFranco started her career as a musician with a look that included a shaved head and big boots. Later, she decided she wanted hair and a pretty dress. But she remembers the first time she walked out onstage in a dress-she heard young women screaming, "Sellout!"
• Conductor Arturo Toscanini sometimes got very angry at his musicians. Often, he would break his baton in anger. Once, his baton would not break, so he took out his handkerchief and tried to tear it; however, it would not tear. Therefore, Mr. Toscanini took off his coat and tore it to shreds. Feeling much better, he continued the rehearsal.
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Bonus Links
Jeannie the Teed-Off Temp
Selected Readings
from that Mad Cat, JD
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In The Chaos Household
Last Night
The computer issues have not been resolved - so, once again, if the page goes stagnant, it's because my computer is in the shop - again.
'Black Panther' Takes Top Prize
SAG Awards
Superhero film "Black Panther," heralded for its mainly black cast and vibrant celebration of African culture, won the top Screen Actors Guild award on Sunday, boosting its stature ahead of next month's Oscars ceremony.
"Black Panther" from Walt Disney Co's Marvel Studios was named best movie ensemble in a surprise triumph over favorite "A Star is Born," the Bradley Cooper and Lady Gaga musical revival, which ended the night without any SAG trophies.
Glenn Close was honored as best film actress for playing a devoted spouse in Sony Pictures film "The Wife." Rami Malek won best film actor for his portrayal of Queen lead singer Freddie Mercury in "Bohemian Rhapsody," released by 21st Century Fox.
The awards from SAG-AFTRA, Hollywood's largest actors' union, are closely watched because actors form the largest voting group in the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences, which hands out the Oscars.
SAG also recognized M*A*S*H" TV star Alan Alda with a lifetime achievement award.
SAG Awards
Mary Poppins Returns Credits
Leno
Moviegoers who stuck around through the end credits of Mary Poppins Returnsmay have noticed a certain retired late-night host's name inexplicably present in the "Special Thanks" section. Jay Leno doesn't appear in a single frame of the Disney film, as far as we know, yet the denim-clad Burbank resident still gets a shout out. What gives? On a recent episode of her podcast, comedian Julie Klausner pondered this very question, prompting a response from Poppins' star Lin-Manuel Miranda, who was able to provide her, and us, with an answer.
As it turns out, when the filmmakers were attempting to recreate the soot-speckled world of 1930s London, they found themselves in need of a period-specific car sound. So singular was this sound that it could apparently not be replicated or imitated (um, have they even heard of Michael Winslow?), so the producers reached out to Leno, one of the world's most prominent collectors of vintage cars, for a solution.
Vulture even went so far as to field a guess on which of Leno's many vehicles was brought in for the film, settling on his 1931 8-liter Bentley Mulliner. Probably a safe bet.
Leno
Can See a 'Colour' Humans Can't
Birds
Birds see a very different world to the one we're familiar with, and now we can get a hint of what that looks like thanks to a specially designed camera that simulates birdo-vision.
Apart from being fascinating, the resulting images also explain why birds can navigate so accurately through dense foliage.
They chose to explore bird vision because birds are very visually orientated - they use their sight to forage and hunt for food - and unlike human eyes, bird eyes can detect a fourth colour.
In our eyes, we have three types of colour receptors, or cones - they are sensitive to red, blue and green frequencies of light. Birds have a fourth receptor that varies across species in the type of frequency it can detect.
Some birds, like Australian honeyeaters, have their fourth colour receptors sensitive to violet light; in others, such as parrots, these cones can detect light further into the UV part of the spectrum.
Birds
Exposes Arctic Landscape
Retreating Ice
The retreat of Arctic glaciers is exposing landscapes that haven't seen the sun for nearly 120,000 years.
These rocky vistas have very likely been covered in ice since the Eemian, a period in which average temperatures were up to 3.6 degrees Fahrenheit (2 degrees Celsius) warmer than present, and sea levels up to 30 feet (9 meters) higher.
"The last century of warmth is likely greater than any century prior to this going back 120,000 years," said study leader Simon Pendleton, a doctoral student at the University of Colorado, Boulder's Institute of Arctic and Alpine Research.
These tundra plains are covered with thin ice caps. Because the landscape is so flat, the ice caps don't flow and slide like typical glaciers, Pendleton told Live Science. Instead, they simply sit on the underlying rock and soil, preserving everything beneath them like the glass of a museum case.
What's preserved includes tiny Arctic plants and mosses that were last alive when the ice enveloped the land. As the ice melts, Pendleton said, it exposes this ancient, delicate vegetation. Wind and water destroy the long-lost plants within months, but if researchers can get to them first, they can use radiocarbon dating to determine the age of the vegetation.
Retreating Ice
Medical Costs
GoFundMe
One-year-old twins Adelaide and Gray Carter were recently diagnosed with a neuromuscular disease that is usually fatal - the treatment costs: $750,000 per child. To cope with that financial burden, their parents are seeking help from the same place used by thousands of other Americans facing crushing medical expenses: the internet.
The children's father, Jarod Carter, has started a GoFundMe page that to date has raised more than $103,000. He is by no means alone. Roughly 250,00 campaigns for dealing with health care costs have been set up on the online fundraising platform, raising total contributions of $650 million - fully a third of all donations made through the site, according to CEO Rob Solomon.
Health coverage has eroded since 2017, with 7 million more Americans becoming uninsured since President-for-now Donald Trump (R-Myopic) took office, according to recent Gallup data. The national uninsured rate stands at 13.7 percent, a four-year high, according to the report.
While many pages on the site are for people who lack health insurance, others have coverage but still face major costs. Carter, a 40-year-old physical therapist with his own practice in Austin, Texas, said the family's insurer, Aetna, "has been really great to us." But the ancillary expenses of looking after his children are heavy.
Although many Americans still lack health insurance, the trend in raising money online to pay for medical costs isn't limited to the U.S. Medical fundraisers are also popular in countries such as Canada and the United Kingdom, which have universal health care. Even when medical bills are covered, associated costs including lost wages, transportation and hotel bills can drain people's bank accounts.
GoFundMe
Science Says
Polar Vortex
It might seem counterintuitive, but the dreaded polar vortex is bringing its icy grip to parts of the U.S. thanks to a sudden blast of warm air in the Arctic.
Get used to it. The polar vortex has been wandering more often in recent years.
It all started with misplaced Moroccan heat. Last month, the normally super chilly air temperatures 20 miles above the North Pole rapidly rose by about 125 degrees (70 degrees Celsius), thanks to air flowing in from the south. It's called "sudden stratospheric warming."
That warmth split the polar vortex, leaving the pieces to wander, said Judah Cohen, a winter storm expert for Atmospheric Environmental Research, a commercial firm outside Boston.
The unusual cold could stick around another eight weeks, Cohen said.
Polar Vortex
Hardened Just In Time
Earth's Core
Earth's inner core solidified around 565 million years ago - just in time to not only save the planet's protective magnetic field from imminent collapse, but also to kick-start it into its current, powerful phase, a new study suggests.
The finding, reported online January 28 in Nature Geoscience, supports an idea previously proposed by simulations that Earth's inner core is relatively young. It also provides insight into how, and how quickly, Earth has been losing heat since its formation 4.54 billion years ago -key to understanding not only the generation of the planet's magnetic shield but also convection within the mantle and plate tectonics.
The planet's iron-nickel core is made up of two layers: a solid inner core and a molten outer core. When that solid inner core formed is a long-standing mystery (SN: 9/19/15, p. 18). "Proposed ages have been anywhere from 500 million years ago to older than 2.5 billion years," says coauthor John Tarduno, a geophysicist at the University of Rochester in New York.
The interplay of the two layers drives the geodynamo, the circulation of iron-rich fluid that powers the magnetic field. That field, surrounding the planet, protects Earth from being battered by the solar wind, a constant flow of charged particles ejected by the sun. As the inner core cools and crystallizes, the composition of the remaining fluid changes; more buoyant liquid rises like a plume while the cooling crystals sink. That self-sustaining, density-driven circulation generates a strong magnetic field with two opposing poles, north and south, or polarity.
Traces of magnetism in ancient rocks suggest that Earth had a magnetic field as far back as 4.2 billion years ago. That earlier field was likely generated by heat within the planet driving circulation within the molten core. But over time, computer simulations suggest, the heat-driven circulation wouldn't have been strong enough alone to continue to power a strong magnetic field. Instead, the field began to shut down, signaled in the rock record by weakening intensities and rapid polarity reversals over millions of years. And then, at some point, Earth's inner core began to crystallize, jump-starting the geodynamo and generating a new, strong magnetic field.
Earth's Core
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