April 1, 2023
Exposing the truth about the guitar industry
The batteries used in guitar pedals are more important than you think. A new pedal from JHS can now simulate the performance of the batteries used by the stars.
Rush
Rush, just Rush That is all.
Didn't I (Blow Your Mind This Time)
Legendary Philly Soul producer Thom Bell (1943-2022) (Guardian Obit) created some of my favourite songs. He produced and co-wrote music for The Delfonics, The Stylistics, and The Spinners that was very groovy, yet also reflected complex and introspective moods. [more inside]
RFC9402: a notation to express exactly how your cat is wedged
Since there is currently no compact notation for describing such media, this document details a standard notation to describe the position and interaction of cats, containers, and related subjects pictured in these images. [more inside]
Spirituality is a Spandrel
The desire for connection and belonging, to nature and to other people; the feeling of being part of something larger than ourselves; the appreciation of beauty; the experience of awe—all are byproducts of other traits that had evolutionary benefit. Another aspect of spirituality is “the creative transcendent,” a name I give to that exhilarating, soaring sensation when we produce something new in the world, discover something new, find ourselves in a state of pure seeing. Painters, musicians, dancers, novelists, scientists, and all of us have experienced the creative transcendent. from The Spiritual Materialist by Alan Lightman [Nautilus; ungated]
Fun outings for visitors with limited mobility
"When I am skimming through the various San Francisco related subreddits, there’s one kind of post guaranteed to get me commenting. It’s when someone asks for tips on where to bring their relatives who are elderly and frail and coming for a visit. The responses are almost uniformly ridiculous." Wheelchair user and disability activist Liz Henry breaks down eight assumptions, and offers ten suggestions for "Fun outings for visitors with limited mobility" plus five ideas for at-home activities. [more inside]
Can I Offer You An Egg In This Trying Time?
On the memetic rhetoric of transgender coming-out comics... but a lot more readable than the subtitle makes it seem like it will be. [more inside]
One night's sleep in pictures
Would you let your dog in your bed? Your children? Your partner? The Guardian set up cameras in nine bedrooms, taking a picture every 30 seconds for 12 hours, to tell the tale of a single night’s sleep. The bedrooms are used by a range of couples and single people, including one couple who sleeps apart and another who share their bed, on occasion, with a third person. Old people, younger parents, children, and pets make an appearance if sometimes briefly.
866 Wii U and 1547 3DS games were purchased with 464 eShop cards.
YouTuber bought EVERY Nintendo Wii U & 3DS game before the Nintendo eShop closes [YouTube] “Nintendo’s decision to close both the Wii U and 3DS eShops might make commercial sense for the company, but for fans and lovers of video game history it’s a disaster, as it’s feared many of the games being removed will disappear and never be seen or made available ever again. Loads of these games are tiny little indie things that probably haven’t been purchased or heard from for years, but that doesn’t mean they’re not worth preserving! [...] In an effort to address this—or at least address it in a single place on as few consoles as possible—YouTuber The Completionist decided to sit down and spend almost a year of his life (328 days in total) buying his way through both libraries.” [via: Kotaku] [more inside]
Marilyn Monroe's Psychoanalysis Notes
Marilyn documented much of her psychoanalytic work in the notebooks she kept throughout the 1950s. Monroe's notebooks reveal a woman versed in Freudian theory. She records her dreams and refers to her unconscious. She coaxes painful histories onto the page.
Who Gets a Liver, Where and Why?
Where do livers come from, and where do they go? Life-saving liver transplants have plummeted in some Southern and Midwestern states with higher death rates from liver disease, while New York and California have made big gains. Not everyone is cool with this. Malena Carollo and Ben Tanen report for The Markup, co-reported with the Washington Post.
Are smartphones and social media causing a teen mental health crisis?
Don't panic about social media harming your child's mental health – the evidence is weak [ungated] - "We're told the internet destroys children's mental health – but Stuart Ritchie read all the relevant studies and saw little to support the claim."[1,2]
Meet the Woylie
Meet the Woylie, also called brush-tailed bettong or brush-tailed rat kangaroo. It's a small (38cm / 14.9 inches long, not including the tail) nocturnal Australian marsupial. Despite weighing 1300 grams (45.8 oz), it can move about six tonnes of soil every year in its quest for food. [more inside]
The Wayne Gretzky of Vasectomies: 58,789 and Done Counting
For years, Dr. Ronald Weiss (archive.org) kept a rigid morning routine. He started his day at half past five with a series of push-ups and pull-ups, a workout he’d performed every weekday morning, almost without fail, since university. He ate a bowl of plain yogurt with granola and berries while reading the newspaper. He drank a single cup of coffee — with milk, no sugar. Then, a few minutes before 8, he walked downstairs to the medical clinic in the basement of his family home, where he performed 14 vasectomies, one after the other, before lunch. Then he had a nap.
Do YOU dare to enter the threatening labyrinth of… GEARWORLD?
Come, unwary adventurers, into the strange, wondrous yet terrifying land of GEARWORLD! Documented by the distinguished travel author Eland the Younger, Gearworld is best described as “an access tunnel under reality.” Originally created by MeFi favorite Hugo and Nebula award winner Ursula Vernon (previously) as the draft for a Twine game, Gearworld has taken on a life of its own with multiple interactive fictions, written in Vernon's distinctive style. [more inside]
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