A Bit More Detail

December 31st, I grabbed a beer
Threw it up, said, "2020 is my year, bitches"
(Three, two, one, Happy New Year)
And I honestly thought that that was true
Until I gave this motherfucker like a month or two
This is getting kind of ridiculous at this point"

Put your hands in the motherfuckin' air
If you kinda hate it here
And you wish that things would
Just like chill for like two minutes

• This article by Mirjana Milovanovic at VICE interviewing self-described cat ladies and letting them explain why they prefer cats to men was informative, and fun.


• Vulture reported that the new Carly Rae Jepsen video, "Now That I Found You", is all about the love of a woman for her cat.


• The plight of feral cats in Kingston and wider Frontenac County is serious, but volunteers are doing their best to help. Global News reports.


• Are cats not psychopaths, but simply misunderstood? The Atlantic makes the case for human ignorance.


• The Guardian shares photos from the Brooklyn Cat Café, where yoga with cats is a thing.


• Emma Stefansky at Thrillist interviewed cat trainer Ursula Brauner, about cats in movies generally and the cats featuring in Captain Marvel specifically. (I really liked Goose.)

• Centauri Dreams extends further consideration the roles that artificial intelligences might play in interstellar exploration.


• D-Brief notes that the genes associated with being a night owl also seem to be associated with poor mental health outcomes.


• Far Outliers looks at the lifeboat system created on the upper Yangtze in the late 19th century.


• Kashmir Hill, writing at Gizmodo, notes how blocking Google from her phone left her online experience crippled.


• Imageo notes that, even if halted, global warming still means that many glaciers well melt as they respond to temperature changes.


• JSTOR Daily looks at the racism that permeated ads in 19th century North America.


• Language Hat looks at how some Turkish-speaking Christians transcribed the Turkish language in the Greek alphabet.


• Lawyers, Guns and Money notes how utterly ineffective the Trump Administration's new refugee waiver system actually is.


• The LRB Blog looks at the film and theatre career of Lorenza Mazetti.


• Marginal Revolution notes, in passing, the import of being a YouTube celebrity.


• Molly Crabapple at the NYR Daily writes about the work of the New Sanctuary coalition, which among other things waits with refugees in court as they face their hearings.


• The Speed River Journal's Van Waffle looks for traces of the elusive muskrat.


• Towleroad shares footage of New Order performing the early song "Ceremony" in 1981.


• Transit Toronto notes that Metrolinx now has an app for Presto up!


• At Vintage Space, Amy Shira Teitel looks at the Soviet Moon exploration program in 1969.


• Window on Eurasia notes the new pressures being placed by rising Islamism and instability in Afghanistan upon Turkmenistan.


• Arnold Zwicky considers, briefly, the little is known about the lives of 1980s gay porn stars Greg Patton and Bobby Pyron. How did they lead their lives?

• This Chaka Grier article on NOW Toronto looks at how activists for different endangered languages--Wolastoqey, Yiddish, Garifuna--use music to try to keep them alive.


• Hornet Stories takes a look at some gay-themed country music.


• This year, 1980s pop star Corey Hart will be inducted into the Canadian Music Hall of Fame. CBC reports.


• Sarah MacDonald at Noisey takes a look at the prescience of Britney Spears' 1999 song "E-Mail My Heart".


• At Wired, Jason Parham praises the new Troye Sivan single, "Lucky Strike", for its profound curiosity in and empathy for other people.

• Marginal Revolution links to a paper suggesting that whereas cities in developed countries tend to be spread evenly across resource-rich agricultural areas, cities in developing countries tend to cluster near coasts where transport is easier.


• At In Medias Res, Russell Arben Fox responds to Krugman in considering what role there is for smaller cities and towns in the 21st century.


• Tracey Lauriault at Policy Options argues that, in projects like Google's involvement in Toronto's Quayside, the underlying values of the AI systems used should always be thoughtfully considered. What do they represent?


• Dangerous Minds shares the oddly haunting YouTube videos of a man who plays classic 1980s pop songs in deserted shopping malls.

• Bad Astronomer Phil Plait looks at the bizarre extrasolar visitor 'Oumuamua, as does Centauri Dreams, as does Bruce Dorminey. Yes, this long cylindrical extrasolar visitor swinging around the sun on a hyperbolic orbit does evoke classic SF.


• The Boston Globe's The Big Picture shares some photos of autumn from around the world.
  
• D-Brief examines how artificial intelligences are making their own videos, albeit strange and unsettling ones.


• Dangerous Minds shares some Alfred Stieglitz photos of Georgia O'Keefe.


• Daily JSTOR takes a look at the mulberry tree craze in the United States.


• The Dragon's Gaze links to a paper examining at water delivery to terrestrial planets in other solar systems. Worlds with as little water as Earth are apparently difficult to produce in this model.


• Hornet Stories profiles the gay destination of Puerto Vallarta, in Mexico.


• Lawyers, Guns and Money notes the new vulnerability of Haitian migrants in the United States.


• The LRB Blog notes the end of the Mugabe era in Zimbabwe.


• The NYR Daily features a stellar Elaine Showalter review of a Sylvia Plath exhibition at the Smithsonian National Picture Gallery.


• Personal Reflections' Jim Belshaw reports on how the production of New England Cheese reflects the modernization of Australian agriculture.


• Roads and Kingdoms reports on the awkward position of Rohingya refugees in India, in Jammu, at a time when they are facing existential pressures from all sides.


• Starts With A Bang's Ethan Siegel shares twenty beautiful photos of Mars.


• Towleroad shares a fun video from Pink, "Beautiful Trauma", featuring Channing Tatum.


• The Volokh Conspiracy notes that a Trump executive order threatening sanctuary cities has been overturned in court.


• Window on Eurasia notes one study claiming that the children of immigrant workers in Russia tend to do better than children of native-born Russians.