Brian Coussens

Battle for biblical archaeology intensifies as Israeli researchers face academic boycott A top archaeology journal now bars Israelis from publishing on Judea and Samaria unless they work with Palestinian authorities, sparking backlash over efforts to erase Judeo-Christian ties to the land...

Unsurprisingly a 1-sided article (see platform) that does not try to present another side. The truth is the PEF's ethics policy is strictly in keeping with intl law, and the historical attempt of the Israeli state, t/the IAA, to assert control over sites within Palestinian areas remains unethical.

Of course. And for field-related journals/publishers, their style sheets often address the main issues I’ve encountered. For the Diss., I’ve found that I’m having to create my own mini style sheet for things not strictly covered by the guides / things for which they give multiple options

Simple things I wish I knew to do when I began dissertating:
keep a list of terms in the dissertation that records how you will spell them throughout the document (esp. if there are multiple spellings) and whether/not you capitalize/italicize/etc. the term #academicsky #academia

Putting aside the freedom of speech/press issue, the most laughable part of the letter is the expectation that “the public” is reading academic articles…

I pride myself on being careful in my work, but all it takes is a crunchy, detail-oriented chapter to remind me just how many mistakes you can actually still make while trying to be careful, especially when trying to make a data-driven chapter readable...

Blue (ie, black & silver) pyredoodle with white accents staring intently into the phone

Someone was insisting on calling her Tutu so she could get her daily Nubz treat via FaceTime #pyredoodle #dogs

Congrats, John! Glad to hear it went well!

That was always my grandmother's go to: Duke's Mayo and a sprinkling of sugar. Had one a couple of days ago!

NB: Homoground is not specifically an academic/writing group, but it is a great coworking community that has performed that same function for me over the past year.

Virtual Queer Coworking 24/7 🌈 Homoground's Virtual Cafe 🌈 is a virtual space for queer people to pop in throughout the day for project support and coworking/collaborating.

An essential tool in my diss. process has been BODY DOUBLING, where you work alongside someone. This year, I have been working in a dedicated queer virtual co-working space called Homoground, & it has been so important to me for actually making progress. #lgbtq #coworking #academic

PSA: LOOK UP FROM YOUR PHONE WHEN WALKING. On campus for ca. 10 min. last pm & saw someone step into the street w/o looking up & nearly get hit &, omw back to the car, saw another come w/in a foot of walking straight into the side of my car. They didn’t bec. I arrived at the same time & alerted them

Three dog balls (yellow with a blue stripe in the center) in a shopping cart

When you find the dog’s favorite toy at a store & buy out their whole supply “just in case” (not sponsored; she found this toy in her sister’s things at my parents’ house & liked it so much Poppa & Tutu gave it to her & it is now 1 of her top tier toys) #pyredoodles #dogs

Me in a white v-neck sitting at my desk with a large white plaster reproduction of the upper part of the King Tut coffin located on the table over my left shoulder

Found this guy (plaster repro of King Tut that my bro gave to me as a Xmas present in our teens) in the family storage unit when I visited last week. Forgot I left him when I moved to NC. Now he has been redeemed from storage and set in the perfect place: staring over my shoulder for video calls 🤣

Also, can we drop the “longtime ally” line from all the articles covering Newsom. You don’t get to rest on your laurels as an ally: allyship is a continual practice and present actions outweigh any supposed history of allyship. He has made very clear that he is not an ally

I guess Newsom figures he can win in 2028 without LGBTQ support. We deserve leaders who aren’t willing to throw any of community under the bus for political points with fascists. If he does it with one group, he will do it with others. Definitely won’t have my vote in a potential presidential race.

How’s the week been going? Apparently fell back to sleep this AM hugging my box of tissues. Always can’t wait til spring but the first sign of pollen in the air, my body goes into full blown revolt…and as often happens, what started as allergies becomes a cold… #allergyseason #allergies #cold

Why can't I make progress? I spent the past week turning a footnote that didn't work into an Appendix, so I've essentially added 10pages to this chapter this week. Luckily, it did result in me resolving a lot of the issues I was having about phasing at the site I'm studying.

Send help. Was writing a footnote, realized it needed more, turned it into an Appendix, & I seem to keep digging myself deeper & deeper into this research hole when I just need to get back to fn so I can move on to the next chapter. Someone come restart my brain.

And this is not to critique the authors. They did a lot of things well. It's just a place we need to improve to make final reports more useful.

If you don't index them, at least include some description/association in the locus list so the reader has any idea of where to find it. Trying to find context of coins, & hours in, I'm really frustrated bec. combing through the stratigraphy chapter for a semblance of locus descriptions is torture.

Archaeologists, please index your locus nos. in the final report. Your readers don't have access to your catalog, and nothing is worse than spending the day combing through hundreds of pages of written text for info you should have been provided with in the 1st place.

In other news, with the apple now gone, she is now barking at the wind because it is causing too much noise (to be fair to her, some of it sounds like someone is right outside the door & her Great Pyrenees side always has things to say about that) #pyredoodle #dogsofbluesky

A blue (ie, in poodles, a black dog that turns silver around 2-3) pyredoodle with a white chest staring intently at the camera/poster in anticipation of her morning apple bites

Meanwhile, someone is awaiting the daily apple tax #pyredoodle #dogsofbluesky (before anyone says anything, no, she does not get any of the sugar-free yogurt pudding)

White bowl with blue and pink flowers around the rim sitting on a cutting board. Bowl contains pink lady apple slices and a orangey yogurt pudding mix and a spoon

My usual breakfast for the past couple of weeks: pink lady apple + butterscotch yogurt pudding (Dannon light & fit Greek nilla yogurt + instant sugar-free pudding) as a dip (also like to use just their Apple Pie flavor without the pudding mix but I like the mousse texture the latter creates with it)

Oh, look, camps for neurospicy folks under the guise of “helping” them…can’t figure out why that rings a bell…

Sometimes you stare at something so long you have to map it out…only to find out the reason it wouldn’t come together is that the information you *actually* need is not there…

Stonewall National Monument New York Info Alerts Maps Calendar Fees “By the time of Stonewall...we had 50 to 60 gay groups in the country. A year later...1500.” Before the 1960s, almost everything about living openly as a lesbian, gay, bisexual (LGB) person was illegal. The Stonewall Uprising on June 28, 1969 is a milestone in the quest for LGB civil rights and provided momentum for a movement. Five visitors and one park ranger standing next to an iron fence as they post rainbow flags. Plan Your Visit Located in Greenwich Village, New York City, Stonewall National Monument is one of the many parks in New York Harbor. Educational images of leaning at Stonewall National Monument Education No Matter where you are, we can bring Stonewall National Monument to your classroom. Find teachers resources here. A rainbow flag overlaid with "Stonewall National Monument, Established 2016" with the NPS arrowhead. LGB Flags What are LGB flags and what days should we celebrate them? Click here to find out.

The National Park Service has removed "T" and all mention of transgender people from the Stonewall National Monument.

Trans women were some of the most influential activists behind the Stonewall movement and what followed.

3 articles of clothing laws were why raids happened.

Erasure.

Wording matters so much in interpreting finds and one of the hardest parts is figuring out what an author means. Sometimes I struggle to parse out the English, so God help me if it is another language, like the German book I read that had 17+ terms related to gravestones, each w/its own nuance.

Did an at-home sleep study last night. Had to take a nap for the 1st time in over a month bec. I felt so bad today. There's got to be a better way other than having someone sleep in a position they never sleep in (justice for the stomach sleepers!) w/wires & tubes all over them.

So cool, but going to confess, the first thing I thought about was they look like a classic blue men's urinal cake/tablet