Jackie Caplan-Auerbach

Intrigued by this extraordinarily inclusive list of languages one can select at a local doctors office. They apparently welcome time travelers and aliens as well as global citizens.

Every graph about the US showing all good things declining and all bad things increasing after a line titled Ronald Reagan

The most accurate graph I have ever come across

If you come for my people, you come through me.

I definitely do not envy those teaching online classes.

Policy in this class is an absolute no on AI use. The first assignment involved watching a video lecture of me explaining the rules and then answering questions about whether or not they understand the rules on plagiarism and AI use. So no excuse for not knowing.

Grading the first assignment of the quarter. First student, first question: answer most likely written by AI.

It's gonna be a long quarter.

Just thinking about the American citizens I know who have been sick/injured abroad, in countries with nationalized health care. They received healthcare benefits paid for by the citizens of those countries.

It's what good people do--they care for the sick. Period.

In case you didn't know what that military shaving ban is all about:

Isn't it amazing? The island is unpopulated--has been for most of recently history (other than some activity in WWII). Likely Aleut presence a long time ago, but nothing recently. So while it's possible that people dug the cave, it's unlikely.

Thank you for standing strong on this one.

A cave on Tanaga Island, Alaska. The rocks around it are columnar jointed.

a geophysicist in a blue coat stands in front of large columnar-jointed basalts.

Bit of fieldwork nostalgia--these photos of an amazing cave in columnar jointed rocks on Tanaga Island. Back in the day when my hair was still brown (almost all grey now).

USGS installs new sensors to detect, warn communities of deadly lahars from Mt. Rainier The US Geological Survey (USGS) has just installed some of the first sensors of their kind on the east side of the mountain.

Hey, that's my student featured in this story on new monitoring stations on Mt. Rainier! Please note the tidy and organized hut interior, a hallmark of Craig's installations. I also appreciate his "my bad" right after they refer to the team as "volcano cowboys". Really proud of this guy.

Someone just brought me a scrapbook that was found under the floorboards of my attic before I lived here. Includes some interesting news articles from 1927 and apparently the cure for diphtheria. Don't tell RFK.

rock.geosociety.org/net/gsatoday...

Ping me if you want to chat about Swifties versus football fans--I've got a ton of data. :)

Honestly, you can't make this stuff up.

Absolute amen to this one.

White House Plans Broad Crackdown on Liberal Groups

So when they came for the trans people and the protestors and the supporters of DEI, did you think they weren't coming for you too?

www.nytimes.com/2025/09/15/u...

The WSJ should pay every trans person $2,000 just for the shit they pulled yesterday.

Maybe the people who baselessly blamed transgender people for Kirk's murder and spread disinformation and hate should apologize.

Folks like Nancy Mace, Don Trump Jr and WSJ

YouTube video by Leslie Warner kd lang "Hallelujah" CSHF 2006

I wanted to share some light with you. These words, this song.

"For like a shaft, clear and cold, the thought pierced him that in the end the Shadow was only a small and passing thing: there was light and high beauty for ever beyond its reach."
~ Tolkien

They cannot hold sway forever.

🕯

Hey Seattle -- let's rally for Science!

I'll be talking about how disinformation campaigns are the heart of the attacks on science.

gonna start with masking tape and a Sharpie. If they don't deliver a new knob soon, I might turn to paint.

The same Supreme Court that said it is unreasonable to consider race when giving kids access to education, has said it's reasonable to consider race when looking to remove someone from the country.

Funny how that works.

This one is Italian too: Bertazzoni. Yours?

And yes, both are in Fahrenheit.

The technician's solution for me is to hold the old knob up next to the new, and turn them both to the same angle, estimating temp off of the old.

He is also ordering a new knob.

Adventures in algebra. Had to get a new oven knob. Temps on the old knob run from 275 to 500. New knob runs 220 to 440. The old knob conveniently marked temperatures at 25 degree intervals, whereas the new one has (no joke) marks every 36.7 degrees.

Find 350 degrees on the new knob. I dare you.

Nobody is “grooming” your kids to be gay or trans but people ARE grooming them to be Nazis.

Anyway when the Trump administration tells you they are concerned about antisemitism, just remember they haven’t told federal agencies that scheduling major events on Jewish High Holy Days is off limits but they do want to deport brown people who oppose genocide

You can do the math

i’ll never get over how blatantly and proveably lying is one of the best political strategies of the modern age

Indeed! It's hard to know if the seismic activity noted there is what we are seeing here; in 1925 we didn't have the seismometers we have today and likely couldn't have detected tiny events like these. But a large one (M3.5 in this case) would have been measurable!