- “Homicides continued to decline in major U.S. cities — by more than 40% in some communities — during the first nine months of the year.” – via @crookedmedia
- How Marcus Smart’s support for cancer patients transformed children’s hospitals – via @theathletichq
- Please spare ninety seconds of your busy day today to watch Miss Piggy roasting Martha Stewart. – via @kottke
- What’s the roundest human-made object ever made? – via @thebadastronomer
- “Building beats talking. It beats being a full-time employee. It beats being well dressed or well spoken or well known. It beats being popular.” – via @ociubotaru
- “If you’re a parent, you know you don’t need a scientific study or some neuroscientist to confirm what you know from experience. There’s a part of you that didn’t exist until you had kids.” – via @dailydad, a fantastic newsletter
- I’m vehemently opposed to styling browser scrollbars, but I like the other nine items in this list of 10 CSS Tricks for UI developers – via @nnnirajn
- It’s effectively impossible to manage uploaded photos on Amazon Alexa devices using the iOS app because if you’ve uploaded more than about two dozen photos, the screen refreshes back to the top any time you scroll down more than a few pages. I posted about this on Twitter a few years ago, and I can’t believe they still haven’t fixed it.
- The complete lack of urgency from players and coaches, in the NFL and college, when down by two or more scores in Q4, makes me question whether any of these guys have ever played Madden. – via me
- The November 17th Bills–Chiefs matchup wasn’t just the game of the week, it was the most-watched NFL regular-season game of 2024 and the most-watched non-holiday game since 2007. – via @theathletichq
- I love The Octonauts, although I do sometimes worry it’s giving my son an unrealistic perception of the coffee consumption rate of the average undersea exploration headquarters polar bear captain. – via @gatordavid
- How The Netherlands Built a Biking Utopia – via distilled
- Here’s some cool stuff you can do with Bluesky (aside from following me, of course).
- There’s No Longer Any Doubt That Hollywood Writing Is Powering AI – via @rking_618
- This is your annual reminder that the album Sugar & Booze by SNL alum Ana Gasteyer is chock full of fantastic holiday music and you can stream it on Alexa.
- In part he cried because he knew what lay ahead. The families of the dead, the people who were shot, had now been in war, like he had. They would struggle like he and so many of his combat buddies had.
- I joined Mastodon seven years ago — a full decade after I started using Twitter, by the way — and still have absolutely no idea how it works. (Note that I’ve spent the last thirty years building web and mobile applications.)
- This kid’s reaction to Lamar Jackson‘s scramble last weekend is the best (via Ravens). – via @randderuiter
- Everything designed for children should be dishwasher safe. Everything. Lunch boxes. Water bottles. T-shirts. Nintendo controllers. Nikes. Backpacks. All of it. – via @gatordavid
- “Only a twisted type of fantasy can see [pornography] in a biblical figure, in a statue that is also an icon of the Renaissance and the most famous statue in the world. It’s not only absurd, it’s a worrying sign of sheer ignorance, in its most literal sense: a lack of knowledge of history – religious history, of Christianity and Judaism, and art history.” – via @italo.americano
- Transitioning to clean energy would reduce the volume and harm of mining dramatically, because a fossil fuel economy requires 535× more mining than a clean energy economy. – via distilled
- The research linking alcohol to breast cancer is deadly solid: Alcohol, regardless of whether it’s in Everclear or a vintage Bordeaux, is carcinogenic.
- The curious case of two Scott Stallings and one Masters invitation – via TheAthletic
- Private schools across the South that were established for white children during desegregation are now benefiting from tens of millions in taxpayer dollars flowing from rapidly expanding voucher-style programs.
- Beyoncé to perform halftime show at Ravens-Texans on Christmas on Netflix
- Street drug deaths in the U.S. are dropping at the fastest rate ever seen, according to a new report by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. – via @npr
- Every time he scores a touchdown, Philadelphia Eagles QB Jalen Hurts donates $5,000.00 to purchase air conditioning units for Philadelphia schools. – via @urphillypal
- I found out this week that I am qualified for so many cabinet positions. – via @msfrancesma
- I didn’t expect a Marvel supervillain reference in this surprisingly interesting article about microwave ovens, but I certainly appreciated it. – via @theatlantic
- Using an innovative laser scanning technique, researchers from ETH Zurich in Switzerland have successfully 3D-printed a robotic hand equipped with synthetic bones, ligaments and tendons. – via @reuters
- Never Have I Ever on Netflix is a scary good under-the-radar laugh-out-loud YA show about grief and families somehow narrated by tennis great John McEnroe. Watch it now.
#FridayFive: A Better House
View the Friday Five from November 15th, 2024
- I created a Bluesky account back in April, but then fell into Threads. I think I’m going to try using the former more than the latter. I very much appreciate that you can get verified there without paying for it, and their verification process is excellent.
- Whether he’s writing a television pilot, a comic book, or one of the greatest superhero movies of all time, Sam Hamm always has Virginia basketball on the brain. I loved this story about the Batman writer who hides UVA basketball Easter eggs in his work. – via David Betancourt @ The Athletic
- After a Montana man illegally cloned and bred an endangered giant sheep species, government agencies must now contend with the illicit offspring.
- I’m very happy to report that my cocktail guide iOS app, bartender.live, is still chugging along. If you’re a fan, please leave a review and/or spread the word. (Thanks!)
- The Miraculous Resurrection of Notre-Dame: This is the story of how an army of artisans turned back centuries to restore the crown jewel of France by hand, and wound up reviving something even greater than the cathedral itself. – via Curious About Everything
- Ok, NOW I’m thinking a lot about the fall of the Roman Empire. – via @chrisjbrinkman
- “Billionaires” puts the focus on an arbitrary number. Bring back “robber barons,” or at the very least, “tycoons” – via @king_mattking
Disney Music in the 1930s
An old college essay
- If you’re bored with the standard New York Times puzzles — or looking for more ways to avoid thinking about the impending collapse of society — Alphaguess and Wordiply are two other fun word games. Worldle is a fun geography game and Framed is a fun movie game. Or see if you can beat my streak of 19 at WikiTrivia. There’s also a sports version of Connections.
- Being a “safe space for both sides” means you’re not a safe space for one side. – via @lingeringperception
- Art Garfunkel describes tearful reunion with Paul Simon: “I cried when he told me how much I had hurt him.” – via @timcarmody
- “I know that you have what it takes to start healing.” – via Coach Bennett’s Newsletter
- “It’s 91 degrees in November… no idea why I’m saving for retirement. At no point did Mad Max check his 401k.” – via @rpgregory87
- The Story Behind Dylan Thomas’ “Do Not Go Gentle Into That Good Night” and the Poet’s Own Stirring Reading of His Masterpiece – via @mariapopova
- This lovely Martha Wainwright track (from the absolutely fantastic Big Little Lies soundtrack) might resonate with some of you lately.
- See also: “The point of winning was not to make themselves happy, it was to make everyone else miserable.” – via @duckswithpants
- These 10 CSS Code Snippets Every UI Developer Should Know and 10 Bootstrap Tricks Every UI Developer Should Know are both handy. – via Niraj Narkhede
- “Don’t let your dreams give up on you.” – via @austinkleon
- “The supplement industry is a multi-billion dollar industry built on hype and deception. Here’s an inside look at what works, what doesn’t, and how to ensure you only use products you can trust.” – super informative, well-researched notes on everything from Vitamin D and collagen to fish oil and creatine, – via Arnold’s Pump Club
“Personally, I’m making a choice to not be fearful.” – via Starship Casual- “America’s collective decision in the 20th century to make cars and the roads serving them the bedrock of all urban and regional planning will go down in history as just another of our nation’s awful, ruinous ideas that we nevertheless clung to for generations, like slavery or lead paint.” – via kottke
- “If you must read one post-election assessment of what went wrong, [The Daily] Kos’s “What went wrong: Part 1” is worth your time.” – via @zeldman
- “If things really go south, expect MAGA Republicans to devour each other as hungrily as the worm who feasted on RFK Jr.’s brain.” – via @heidiyounggrasshopper
- “You know things are really bad when you’re Kübler-Rossing completely out of order.” – via @gatordavid
- I’ve been a fan of Daring Fireball for more than twenty years, and his How It Went essay might just be the best thing he’s ever published. If you’re looking for a tiny sliver of hope after the election, I highly recommend reading it. (Maybe grab a box of tissues first.)
- And remember, “This is the same country that elected Barack Obama… twice.” – via @geoffbaron
