Commit a sufficient number of sins during your life, presumably.

Fun national jukebox day fact: the popular “Rock-ola” brand, which could not sound more like an exercise in exuberant Fifties pop culture marketing, was actually designed and sold by a guy named David Rockola.

The world is a beautiful place and worth fighting for.

When both of us are at home, often sitting no more than feet apart, my wife texts me pictures of the dogs.

Revisiting what I think we can classify as my cutest video of 2025. I don't see December surpassing it.

Heather Steffen, in “Adjunct”: 38 University Keywords Neoliberalism is a concept that recurs throughout this book because many observers name the current era in US higher education the moment of the "neoliberal university," In one basic definition, neoliberalism names the set of economic, political, social, and cultural processes through which free markets have come to serve as our dominant model for social relations and institutional organization: • Social relationships become defined primarily through their economic facets. Students are regarded by their educational institutions as customers rather than learners, and, as Childress writes, "College has become a form of indispensable employment insurance, available for purchase on the open market at protection levels from community college bronze to Ivy League platinum" (2019, 48). • Public goods and services become privatized. Formerly public enterprises are now run by for-profit entities (e.g., for-profit charter schools; private prisons; privately held patents on the results of publicly funded research). • Individuals behave like entrepreneurs, and organizations behave like businesses: we imagine ourselves as mini-enterprises trying to grow our capital in the world's marketplace (e.g., the concept of human cap. ital, resume building for high schoolers). Organizations and institutions like nonprofits, universities, government agencies, and NGOs function on the model of for-profit businesses, despite their not-for-profit tax designation. Public institutions that have not formally been privatized become neoliberalized in that they behave like businesses. • Responsibility and risk are individualized. Rather than viewing the responsibility to employ, feed, clothe, and house everyone as society's responsibility, our society views it as each person's responsibility to fend for themselves (eg, the transition from welfare to workfare, drastic wealth/income inequalities). Similarly, we expect risks to be borne by individu…

Adjunct, Continued: working lives, often shifting careers several times. Employers extract cost savings through tactics like automated scheduling, keeping workers just under the number of hours needed to gain benefits, falsely defining workers as "contractors" or "consultants," outsourcing, and speed-up (being tasked with more work but not more time to do it in).

Or @hsteffen.bsky.social, in “Adjunct,” giving a concise, bullet-pointed definition of neoliberalism that can go right onto a classroom handout or union meeting flyer — I’ll teach it next week 🙏

My ambitious gingerbread house collapsed so dramatically and to such joy amongst the youngest members of the family, that I am required to make a structurally unsound gingerbread building for demolition every year. Fortunately not that difficult.

This is AWESOME, like an annual reenactment of Fall of the House of Usher

This mood is just - really strong right now.

Every screen grab of these emails makes me realize learning to read was my first mistake.

Fetch me the melon baller, I tire of my vision.

ZOMG LET ME TELL YOU ABOUT THE SHALE

Okay, so the Burgess Shale is a fossil bed in British Columbia that contains a whole bunch of fossils of weirdass creatures from the Cambrian era, over 500 million years ago. But the great thing about the shale is that it has fossilized SOFT PARTS!

r/boston u/migrational_coconut • 1d Spotted a baby alligator in the Charles Salamanders Yesterday on my run, I was flabbergasted to spot this tiny alligator hanging out in Turtle Pond (on the Charles River bike path. My assumption is that he is someone's pet who was either lost or dumped (but he still gave me QUITE a jump scare at 7AM). I called Animal Control and was sent to voicemail - hopefully someone can grab him before it gets too cold. From instagram, it looks like some other folks have spotted him along the river too.

Joe's Crazzy Critters • Follow 1d • Q ... Tonight NBC10 Boston contacted me for an interview regarding the small American alligator that was spotted in the Charles River near Back Bay. After the interview, more information was shared about the location the alligator was last seen. So, I grabbed a head lamp and flashlight and took a ride into Boston. With the cold temps, the alligator had very low chances of surviving. With some luck and a couple of bright flashlights after 15 minutes I found the Boston alligator. I was able to capture him safely and he will be warm and housed until we get more information and instructions on what's next for this little guy. We are hoping that he will be a new resident and ambassador here at Joe's Crazzy Critters

New England Wildlife Center & • Follow •.. 5h • Meet Charles, the baby alligator who made quite the splash in Boston this week! ? Thanks to the quick action (and above-and-beyond dedication) of Joe's Crazzy Critters, Charles was safely rescued from the cold water of the Charles River last night and brought to us for care. Our veterinarians Greg, Harry, and Tess examined him today and determined he has an upper respiratory infection. He's now getting antibiotics and a warm, safe place to recover. Alligators don't belong in New England, and it's likely Charles was released by someone who couldn't care for him anymore. If you ever find yourself in that position, please call us and we are happy to work with you find a humane solution. Never release a pet into the wild. The Odd Pet Vet is dedicated to giving every creature the expert care they deserve. If you your scaled, furred, or feathered family member needs a check-up, give us a call! Learn more: newildlife.org/odd-pet-vet

baby alligator in a bin marked "live animals" being held aloft in a man's hand

I have the most wonderful story for you all today: baby alligator spotted in Charles River, then immediately rescued by local reptile enthusiast

Computers were a skill. They were taught in classrooms as a skill. Skills give you power over your tools because you work them as an expert and that is leverage to multiply externally.

And then computers became an A/B tested telemetry-based advertising conduit to brains for SaaS recurring revenue.

"save your anger for 2026" wait you think I'll run out in a year this is why I hate amateurs

So it turns out... the US air travel system was incredibly, deeply dependent on federal funding to just run day-to-day all this time, to the benefit of private airline shareholders, when everyone thinks that state-run trains are leeching off the government. Weird!

An artwork of two cats (brown and longhair white) sitting cuddly together on sandy beach, while sun is shining on them softly. The handwritten text over their heads says: "You have me. Beyond the death of the last star, you have me."

Beyond the death of the last star, you have me. #catart #artwork #digitalart (actually mixed media art)

I really love this Vincent Van Gogh quote:

"To do good work one must eat well, be well housed, have one's fling from time to time, smoke one's pipe, and drink one's coffee in peace."

No romanticizing the starving artist. Van Gogh said UBI all the way.

Update

Sound up for snoozies

Same

that a bunch of billionaires have been irreversibly brainwormed by getting addicted to a glorified chat room adds credence to my theory that spending too much time on IRC as a child acts as a powerful inoculant to the worst impulses of an escalatory group dynamic

CHOTINER: Hold on a sec. You're saying ... it starts with an earthquake?

STIPE: Birds and snakes and aeroplanes

CHOTINER: And Lenny Bruce is not afraid?

STIPE: Eye of a hurricane

CHOTINER: Listen to yourself churn!

STIPE: World serves its own needs

CHOTINER: Don't mis-serve your own needs

David Zinn FB #Art #StreetArt
At this time of year, don't be surprised if your neighborhood gets a little spooky.

But they were looking in all the wrong places

#Photography #InfraredPhotography #EastCoastKin #Nature #Landscape

A vintage tile floor with hexagon tiles of a light field with repeating blue pedal flowers and a darker blue center.

Good morning Bluesky!

some people will have definitely happened

Same, change machine. Same.

showing up to the function wearing my G-type equipment

A tumblr response from FurryProvocateur: "appreciate what we have for once in your life you ungrateful cunt"

Found the best reply to doomposting.