JNL

Men on this platform, many of you SUCK at simply sitting with and accepting the fact that moving through the world in a female body involves constant interactions with males that are different and more difficult than you imagine things to be

derpy cat as desk ornament

(this is not a momentary pose- he is as zonked out as it seems. I keep trying to scoot him, which is very definitely going to knock things off my desk next)

#catstodon

Hugely holy shit

https://www.theguardian.com/news/ng-interactive/2026/apr/18/harvard-university-antigua-slavery-history

It has become clear that the only part of Vancouver we are going to know on this trip is Richmond; this seems like a major fail along some metrics but y'all, I am so grateful for this place (and charmed by it, even) and the helpful hospitality of its people. From the Chinese-language laundromat a few weeks ago to the Chinese-language pharmacy and tea shop and grocery today, this community has saved my ass, and I like it.

we live in a very old two story Vermont farmhouse and every other member of my family opens its various heavy interior doors like they are conducting a police raid

On the minus side, we've been gone for a month, and our "small bathroom update" apparently looks like this (sitter just sent pics) 🤦🏼‍♀️😞☠️

On the plus side, we are now like ACTUALLY WAIT WAIT WAIT ...

[whispers]

*Japanese shower closet* 🌺

fuck

I do really appreciate the tactics and framework of this piece of journalism, though- 'let's methodically compare what is happening with what the law requires'

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2026/jul/09/california-universities-military-equipment

We now rejoin your Wednesday, already in progress

I hate it

Explain yourself, #Ohio 🧐

Last night after eating dive tacos we took a walk in an attempt to also eat dive ice cream and arrived just as it closed.

I am telling you this backstory because I feel weird about what happened next

which is that we wandered back to the very happening sort of weirdly indoor/outdoor hipster bar we had passed en route, decided to go in, got seated at the bar, had drinks and dessert

AND A FANTASTIC TIME

and then literally used maps to figure out where we were and discovered that it is a thing called SheWolf and it is pretty much the most expensive hipster thing you can do right now in midtown

Me: [talking about funding a mutual aid pool for our Iranian cohortmates] I just feel somewhat responsible, care-side- the government of my country is literally destroying their country

My respondent: [whose parents ... emigrated to Canada ... from Vietnam] ... ... ... .... Yeah.

Tell me your favorite things in #Cleveland and #Toledo. Like if I wanted to really know either one as a place, seen through the eyes/experienced through the feet of someone who knows and loves its gritty self

the amount of UVM swag that has appeared in our home over the course of this year is remarkable and also alarming

it is everywhere

a residue of jetsam

a green and gold self-reproductive system taking root in a new host

We need to buy a car. We are willing to consider electric. (I do not need you, I promise, to freak out and try to sell us. We live with someone who has allllll of those bases covered. We also live in and travel to places that range from 'fairly rural' to 'very very rural' to 'lol' as far as charging stations, so that has been a significant impediment, especially given winter weather and safety.)

With that as preamble, here is my question. It is my only question. Yes, I have met you, mastodon.

**What do we need to be aware of and on the lookout for buying a USED electric car**

Thank you

It's funny how we tie specific people in our lives to things in ways that are flattening and not rational as a way of 'knowing' them or the world

Someone in my life (someone HERE; hello 😂 ) has asserted that they love oysters more than almost any food and I now think of them EVERY SINGLE TIME I see the word "vibrio" which is unfortunate and tragically funny.

Something like 1 BILLION oysters are consumed US-side every year. Most people do not experience vibrio even once in their lives.

Moreover, this person does not love bacteria. They don't have anything in particular to SAY about bacteria.

They simply REALLY love oysters.

But in the space forced open by our differential valuing of risk, which is underlain by our different experience of the world (I honestly don't know if I've ever eaten a fresh raw oyster, for starters), one way I now think of this person is "vibrio"- I attach the label of the risk that I assume they're ignoring.

I wonder where else we do this to one another.

Like 2.5 years ago I asked here about letting my teen acquire some used full sized solar panels.

Fast forward to now.

He just took me down to the basement where a battery, an inverter (a pretty intense inverter 😅), and a watt counter or whatever it's called, are wired to said panels. It's live. We have backup power. Apparently we have for months.

Holy shit.

what happened to annie lowrey's brain

(marrying ezra klein inarguably did not help)

https://archive.is/OJ7vH

has Chipotle's red sauce gotten less intense over the years or do they dim its wattage to regional spice tolerance

Our term life insurance is expiring (right when we knew it would, obviously, which is to say, right when kid1 is starting college 🥴).

The continuation fees for our current policy are hilariously ridiculous, so we are going to need something else.

Anyone in the US got good recs for term life in your 40s and 50s? We still need great coverage for our working years and it cannot cost [checks notes] $550 US per month. 😂

"I know people are really going to come after me for publishing this take"

have u considered that this is because it sucks

We now have at least three varieties of ant (small, medium, and LARGE, as it happens) trying to stake scout claims in various parts of our home and while we've escalated to baits we have not called an exterminator (who would place a larger bait in the ground near the house foundation) as we would have in the Missouri River valley

I did consider it ... this is the time when one would consider it ...

last night I contemplated my kitchen with murder in my heart

but there is a family of striped chipmunks that live in the rock wall steps from our foundation and I would be wrecked if I somehow poisoned them

We live on the side of a mountain

Our mountain abuts a huge nature preserve

It is we who live where the ants live

I am not giving them the house

but neither am I willing to salt the earth

I guess this cohabitation is just how spring is gonna be

EVERY YEAR

but

I still don't like it

I have basically spent the years of this decade doing an intensive inquiry about how capitalism works- structurally, materially, as an incentives system, across the history of the US and colonial Europe, etc

With that as background, I will just say

I am astonished how many otherwise thinking people unreflectively believe it possible to know what AI is or isn't as part of our current societal and global moment

in ways totally divorced from what capitalism is

Teen2, complaining (fairly, in our opinion- the naked favoritism, which is also highly gendered, of their music teacher is pretty wild) about the dynamics of orchestra:

29 out of 30 of us get detention if we ask to sharpen a pencil during class ... but Maura can be making apple strudel in the Garden of Eden and all is well

What is sweet in your life in this season?

What is bittersweet?

word (and we are a FARMING state)

https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2026/may/26/vermont-paraquat-weedkiller-ban

Driving across Ohio while listless and exhausted, a playlist

1. https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=gWBG1j_flrg

back in Vermont just in time for ant season 😱

Headline: Supreme Ct Sides with Oil and Gas Companies!!!

Those of us with legal training: 🤦🏼‍♀️

We are doing an intentional stock up around here, both groceries and household items.

It's annoying and expensive, and I've become convinced that the imprecision of guesswork (unless you run a VERY tight ship- we do not), the not-eternal shelf life of most things, and the reality that consumables are just shitty investments, in general, mean that this is not really recommended as a FINANCIAL hedge. You are more likely to lose money than gain it- the margins are just thin and the wrong guesses on needs add up quickly. Thus, I'm not recommending this as an inflation dodge except for things that you absolutely, definitely run through on a 3-month cycle (and in those cases you'll wish you bought more even though storage space is limited. There's no winning 🤷‍♀️ )

That huge caveat aside, what I do think stocking up is useful for is preparedness in the event of disruptive emergencies, and just generally to keep your household flowing in weird times.

In THAT sense: what are you storing NOW?