- Some resistance leaders have created a Google Doc to track what members of Congress are doing during this March recess.
- A flooded quarry, a mysterious millionaire and the dream of a new Atlantis: An innovative mission on the Welsh border, funded by an anonymous private investor, has begun work to create a ‘permanent human settlement’ under the sea.
- What do you think are the odds that you will die during the next year? Try to put a number to it — 1 in 100? 1 in 10,000? Whatever it is, it will be twice as large 8 years from now. Gompertz Law is fascinating fun with statistics, even if it gets a little more terrifying to read every time.
- If your website’s “LOGIN” menu link opens a new window or browser tab, please know that every single person who clicks it hates you.
Make It Stop:
- Engineers and executives at the so-called “Department of Government Efficiency” are drawing healthy taxpayer-funded salaries — sometimes from the very agencies they are cutting.
- A Timeline of the Politicization and Weaponization of the Justice Department – via kottke
- Secretary of Agriculture Brooke Rollins told Fox that the solution to high egg prices is for people to raise chickens in their backyards. – via Today in Politics
- The Los Angeles Times removed its new AI-powered “insights” feature from a column after the tool tried to defend the Ku Klux Klan.
- With its ASMR videos of people being forced out of the country, the White House is turning suffering into entertainment. The administration is trying to showcase its program of “mass deportation” as reality-show style entertainment, through which voters will rationalize their cruelty.
- Fired federal employees – some with top security clearances – were not given exit briefings. That means, allegedly, their laptops, security badges, usernames and password, etc. were not collected either. I cannot fathom this level of government incompetence.
Posts tagged “statistics”
- Italy has embraced a novel approach to integrate olive oil into its tourism industry through oleotourism, an initiative that invites visitors to engage with the olive oil production process, offering experiences that range from guided tours of olive groves and mills to tasting sessions and educational workshops.
“In the final analysis, the progress of our civilization will be retarded if any large body of citizens falls behind. Without the help of thousands of others, any one of us would die, naked and starved.” – Franklin Delano Roosevelt- Scottie Scheffler, 2024 PGA Tour Player of the Year, missed the first two tournaments of the season because he needed surgery to repair his hand after slicing it while attempting to make homemade ravioli on Christmas Day.
- A growing number of US government websites have gone offline as of Saturday, including several related to USAID and others focused on youth programs, Africa, and more.
- A newly discovered asteroid has a tiny chance of smacking Earth in 2032. It’s very unlikely, thankfully, but what should be truly concerning is that nobody was even aware of it until two days after it made its last closest pass to us.
- A dire prediction: “[W]hen NIH and other health agencies emerge from the current freeze they will have been emasculated and politicized, prohibited from releasing information and research whose implications the Trump administration doesn’t like, banned from making policy recommendations that are inconvenient for Trump or at odds with the prejudices of the MAGA base.” – via Jodi Ettenberg
- When I was a kid, most of my possessions were very inexpensive, but tremendously meaningful. A baseball hat or an action figure or a comic book only cost a few dollars, but meant the world to me. My kids have tremendously expensive possessions that are very meaningless. An iPhone or iPad or AirPods cost hundreds or thousands of dollars but have essentially zero sentimental value. I’m sure this says something important about capitalism, but I don’t have time to think about it at the moment.
- Chris Coyier wrote a little about the pros and cons of maintaining your own website that’s worth a read. (And he mentions POSSE, which is something I love.)
- Here’s a cool statistical analysis done to determine whether NFL referees unfairly favor the Kansas City Chiefs. (Spoiler: Yup.)
- General Stuff
- Your body wasn’t built to last: a lesson from human mortality rates is fascinating.
- If you go through life free of bad habits, you won’t live forever, but it will feel like it.
- Top Ten Favorite Numbers
- I guess if hanging out with beautiful women, on the beach, in Spain, drinking, on a Tuesday afternoon, while being ridiculously rich is your definition of “cool”, then… yeah, being Leonardo diCaprio is probably fun.
- When you’re old, you have to have something to give you pleasure.
- So what does all this mean if you’re ambidextrous?
- I read Men’s Health and Sports Illustrated all the time. I never read Time or Newsweek. This is why.
- I can’t see any special effects, but I find it hard to believe that this amazing waterslide jump real.
- Coke vs. Pepsi: The truth about the logos.
- About a decade ago I worked for a company that did “every-other-Friday-off” and I thought it was extraordinary.
- Techie Stuff
- The Smoking Gun catches a loser.
- Apple releases Mac OSX 10.5.8 update. If you have a Mac, click the little Apple logo in the top left and choose “Software Update…” to update your system. (This means you, mom.)
- To keep the Google Analytics code from interfering with page rendering you can use jQuery to load and execute the ga.js file.
- PHP comes with a bunch of functions designed to help you manage URLs.
- And speaking of URLs… Comcast will now send you to a crap spam page if you type an URL incorrectly.
- Gator Stuff
- Urban Meyer: This is it.
- The University of Tennessee has some serious issues.
- Welcome back, Riley!
- College Football Preseason Top 25 Power Rankings: Cheerleader Edition
The Lord Knows the Score
Notes on a funny acronym
Fortune’s Formula
I am not even 100 pages into my latest William Poundstone book and I already know it’s going to be a favorite. Fortune’s Formula, The Untold Story of the Scientific Betting System That Beat the Casinos and Wall Street is the fourth Poundstone book I’ve read. The man is a genius of a writer. Labyrinths
Alexa Is Skewed
In which I complain about SEO
SEC
Southeastern Conference Statistics
Slim Shady
How incredible is this? I just reached into a 14 oz bag of M&M’s without looking and grabbed five green ones. Five. All the same color. Crazy.