OtterB

Looks enjoyable. I just picked it up from KU.

GOOD NEWS! Researchers at Stanford University have developed a UNIVERSAL vaccine known as GLA-3M-052-LS+OVA, that protects against a wide range of respiratory viruses, bacteria AND even allergens. The vaccine is delivered intranasally AND provides broad protection in the lungs for several MONTHS.

Maternal grandfather was a farmer in the Virginia Piedmont. Not sure about paternal grandfather. He had, I think, a business that included quarrying limestone in Texas and Louisiana, but it may have gone bankrupt in the Depression.

When someone says „Scientists do not want you to know“ you can dismiss everything from there on. Scientists want you to know. They are desperate that you know. They can’t shut up about what they found out and want you to know.

😳🫣

Full employment for hermits!

17. A Gentleman Under the Mistletoe, Grace Burrowes. Lord Julian #7. Julian is wrestling with being in charge of Yule festivities at the manor while his brother the duke travels on the continent. Several family mysteries are unraveled.

16. A Gentleman of Unreliable Honor, Grace Burrowes. Lord Julian #6. Lord Julian’s semi-estranged mother summons him to a house party to help her find some letters that have gone missing.

I read several of them and then stopped. I am pleased to get back to them.

15. A Gentleman in Search of a Wife, Grace Burrowes. Lord Julian series, mysteries that aren’t murders featuring an English nobleman recovering from physical and mental damage from the war in France. A friend of his semi-fiancée wants to find what happened to his wife who disappeared 5 years ago.

14. The Comfortable Courtesan, L A Hall. Re-re-read. First of a long series about Madame Clorinda and the life and times of her and her friends and staff. Starts in the Regency period.

“I cannot remember any of the things that were on my list of things to do. I will just have to sit here and do nothing,” said Toad.

Religion extended to its logical conclusion: at the end of Time (and also way sooner) the Son of God, enthroned in glory, looks down at these people, scowling in divine fury, and (with canonical support) growls: "You. Took. My. CRAYONS."

Since we are losing review space left, right and centre, and Goodreads is making that worse, I'm now going to be doing regular romance review roundups on my blog. Get recs here! Share your own!

kjcharleswriter.com/2026/02/25/r...

YouTube video by WJZ Otters enjoy the snow at Baltimore's National Aquarium's Harbor Wetland

youtu.be/cIPCLIUxyGI

Kits, cats, sacks, and wives

I really enjoy the Comfortable Courtesan series by LA Hall. Historical England, some romance but mostly not. An ensemble cast of Madame Clorinda’s friends and staff, of mixed class, race, occupation, and nationality. The first set begins in the Regency, later subseries follow younger characters.

As one does, indeed.

And the rest of us would like to see you do it in the gold medal competition.

Golf commentator voice: oh, you seldosee a point of order deployed with such skill.

Spectators: (restrained clapping)

I am pleased to learn that relocating from NC to NM has not lost your Weird Cafe Conversation touch.

Photo of snow-covered car in driveway. 2 story house in the background, deep blue sky. Car is recognizable by a small section of back window and windshield wipers flipped up out of the snow.

Reminds me of a picture I took 10 years ago in the DC area that I call “I could have sworn I left a Prius out here somewhere.” Yours I think is even more thoroughly covered than mine was.

IMO a plus of virtue signaling for the signaler is trying to become what you want to be. A plus for the observer is normalizing virtuous action. The downside is, as you point out, when it becomes hypocrisy. Virtue signaling as a substitute for virtue, not in any way in support of virtue.

A photo of an ice cream machine with a sign reading, "Anything is possible with ice cream." Beneath that is a hand lettered sign reading, "No ice cream".

2026 basically

I am listening and wishing you and the critters all the best.

It didn’t leave my own desk, but when I worked for a utility company I giggled for a week over my draft of a letter referring to the Vice President of Unclear Operations. (**Nuclear** It’s supposed to be **Nuclear Operations**)

13. Nirvana Express: Journal of a Very Brief Monkhood, by S P Somtow. Somtow, a Thai writer of SFF and a composer of classical music, follows the Thai tradition of spending time - 2 weeks, for him - as a Buddhist monk. Mix of Buddhism, monk’s daily life, and how it fits with the outside world.

I am also hanging out in the ER, with my daughter, adult with intellectual disabilities and very little speech. Her ugly cough that came out of nowhere was the beginning of pneumonia. She’s on various IV meds and will be staying overnight. But we are in an ER room, thus avoiding Dante’s DMV.

My husband, after a bad fall from a ladder with several broken bones including a shattered wrist, had high blood pressure that concerned the hospital staff. All praise to the pain management hospitalist who looked him over and said, “You don’t have a blood pressure problem, you have a pain problem.”

So glad this went well. You were *due* something going well. I hope the next steps get you answers and solutions.

I don’t want to stir up a disagreement you have chosen to drop, and I did not see the original post, but IMO it’s the term “life hack” that’s causing the problem. Perhaps it’s supposed to be a neutral “a trick I use” but I have found in other contexts that it implies a value judgement.