I'll miss it. I thought it was good information to know when buying an appliance

Just as the Midwest heads into tornado season, hurricane season is coming up as well…

Oh no. Put 'em together in a room and watch Prevost politely chew Vance up and spit him out. Not sure about that. 20 minutes with Vance and Pope Francis was so consumed with the futility of dealing with that level of stupid that he lost his will to live. I daresay Pope Leo is stronger but I see no reason to take a chance.

My colleagues and I are talking about this article. It's truly distressing. And some of them didn't have any sense that this is happening to the extent it is. I started changing a lot of the assessments I do in fall 2023 because of ChatGPT, but what I do doesn't work in all classes, and then some instructors haven't even adapted any of their classes.... But anyway, yeah, things are bad and they're going to get worse....

@wtg I look forward to your verdict. I've been meaning to try it out.

Good grief.

Wow. Those are amazing results. Will Linda McMahon be known as the person who killed it? When Mississippi lawmakers in 2013 approved legislation to improve students’ basic reading skills, it fell to State Superintendent Carey Wright to make it happen. She ensured that all K-3 teachers were trained in the “Science of Reading” and hired literacy coaches at schools that had the highest percentage of low-achievers. guide the effort, Wright turned to the Regional Educational Laboratory Southeast, based at Florida State University, one of 10 federally funded labs nationwide. Little-known even among many educators, the labs, created by Congress in 1965, work with states and school districts to implement research-based practices.​ By 2019, Wright and her colleagues had pulled off what is now known as the “Mississippi Miracle,” with students in this deep red state making greater literacy gains than in any other. Fourth-graders in Mississippi rose from 49th in the nation to 29th — adjusting for demographics, it now ranks near the top of the U.S. in both fourth-grade reading and math, behind just Florida and Texas, according to the Urban Institute. “They were huge partners with us,” Wright said of the lab in an interview this week. “It’s just this amazing group of researchers and content-area specialists.” But that distinction wasn’t enough to save the Regional Educational Laboratory Southeast — or the nine other RELs, as they’re called. On Thursday, the U.S. Education Department announced that it had terminated $336 million in contracts with the labs, saying auditors had uncovered “wasteful and ideologically driven spending not in the interest of students and taxpayers.” The move has left researchers and literacy advocates shaking their heads. A director at a top research firm with many federal contracts, who asked not to be identified to avoid retaliation, said she got the sense from the sudden, broad cuts that “no one went in and took a really careful look at where the RELs were being helpful.” While some lab projects likely haven’t led to improvements in practices or student outcomes, she’s doubtful that department officials even pored over such data. “Someone decided that this whole program needed to go.” https://www.the74million.org/article/trump-cuts-research-lab-that-helped-nurture-mississippi-miracle/

Bonne Maman is yummy. I try not to eat too much of their cherry preserves.

The Republican-led House on Thursday passed a bill that seeks to codify President Donald Trump’s executive order that renamed the Gulf of Mexico to the Gulf of America. Though all Democrats and one Republican — Rep. Don Bacon of Nebraska — opposed the bill, Republicans narrowly passed the measure, 211-206, sending it to the Senate for a vote. Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene of Georgia introduced the GOP bill after Trump signed an executive order in January that ordered Interior Secretary Doug Burgum to “take all appropriate actions to rename the Gulf” and update a database of the “official names for geographic features in the 50 states." Democrats, meanwhile, accused Republicans of ignoring more important matters while taking the time to evaluate this bill. "What might members of Congress under this temporary Republican majority be debating on the floor today?" House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries, D-N.Y., asked during debate ahead of the vote. "Would it be legislation about the economy? Something about healthcare, anything about social security? Perhaps something on public safety, maybe national security matters? Anything to bring to life the American dream for hardworking American taxpayers?" No," Jeffries continued, "What Republicans have decided to spend this entire legislative day doing is to debate a bill to rename the Gulf of Mexico.” While Trump does not need congressional approval to ensure the name change is reflected across the federal government, the bill would prevent a future president from easily reversing the move through executive action. Bacon said Tuesday that he plans to vote "no," calling the legislative effort "juvenile." “We’re the United States of America. We’re not Kaiser Wilhelm’s Germany or Napoleon’s France. I just — we’re better than this. It just sounds like a sophomore thing to do," Bacon told CNN. https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/congress/house-vote-bill-codifying-trump-gulf-america-mexico-executive-order-rcna205501

Nice. I like your house.

Tropic

My Dad gave me two pieces of good advice- keep your feet on the ground- and it pays to be a realist.

The squirrels and chipmunks go after the black currants and the red gooseberries once they start ripening (still a few weeks off - we have tiny berries forming but they are of no interest to the rodents). We came up with this PEX and PVC combo to create a greenhouse-y thing that we can drape bird netting or row covers on. 25' of PEX for $7; we had some short sections of PVC that we pounded into the soil in the beds. We bought a furring strip that we'll run across the top and fasten to the hoops for a bit more lateral stability. [image: 6e06e359-0572-443c-bb3f-3e02919c4b76.jpg] Easily removed after the berries have been picked. I think I'm going to do a version of this on the elevated beds that I plant greens in.

Denmark's foreign minister says he will summon the US ambassador to address a report that Washington's spy agencies have been told to focus on Greenland amid Donald Trump's threats to take over the island. "It worries me greatly because we do not spy on friends," Lars Løkke Rasmussen said, responding to the report in The Wall Street Journal. According to the newspaper, US spy agencies were told to focus efforts on the semi-autonomous country's independence movement, and American goals to extract mineral resources there. Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard accused the Journal of attempts to "undermine" President Trump "by politicizing and leaking classified information". While not denying the report, she accused the newspaper of "breaking the law and undermining our nation's security and democracy". Rasmussen, who was attending an EU ministers meeting in Warsaw, said the report was "somewhat disturbing". "We are going to call in the US acting ambassador for a discussion at the foreign ministry to see if we can confirm this information," Rasmussen said. "It doesn't seem to be strongly rejected by those who speak out. That worries me." https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/c0eley5gy8wo

@Steve-Miller said in My new stereo system: @Mark I listened to that album so much when it first came out that I wore it out. I even had my artist friend airbrush a copy of that album cover on the refrigerator door in my first camper. Haven’t thought about it in years. Time to listen again! Lately I’ve been thinking about buying a vintage system. Nothing fancy- probably a Pioneer SX-535 like the one I bought in 1975 for $36/month. Been watching vintage stereo YouTube videos and appears that they made a ton of them, they’re reliable, parts are available and they’re easy to service. The soft blue backlight would set the perfect mood for listening to the Surf’s up album! Check out Sounds Classic in Rockford, IL. They really have some nice, fully restored, vintage audio equipment. https://www.soundsclassic.com/index.html

I didn't follow the links in the article, but if you want to see more submissions to the contest, click here: https://www.gdtfoto.de/seiten/gdt-nature-photographer-of-the-year-2025.html