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the red queen's race

The Red Queen’s Race

No new amendments arrived, and I finished an Office Action on the amendment which was on my Expedited docket. I also wrote an Office Action on one of the three cases on my Amended docket, but I couldn’t post it for credit, since it was an Examiner’s Answer responding to an Appeal Brief. Instead, I posted it to my supervisor for consultation. If she signs it, and then a second supervisor signs it, I will be able to post it for credit, and then, at some future time, the Board of Appeals will decide how to rule on it. Meanwhile, I am still at three cases on my Amended docket, but down to zero on my Expedited docket.

I also finished a first action on my oldest Regular New application. This coming week, I hope to do a first action on another Regular New case. There’s just one week left in the third quarter.

NGC 6302: The Butterfly Nebula

https://apod.nasa.gov/apod/ap250606.html

The bright clusters and nebulae of planet Earth's night sky are often

https://apod.nasa.gov/apod/ap250606.html

Shipwreck mystery solved after nearly 140 years

https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/czel8y3dxp5o?utm_source=DamnInteresting

Shipwreck mystery solved after nearly 140 years (from bbc.com)

https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/czel8y3dxp5o?utm_source=DamnInteresting

What FDR's New Deal Gave Us

Posted by Miss Cellania

https://www.neatorama.com/2025/06/06/What-FDRs-New-Deal-Gave-Us/

The Great Depression changed the US in more ways than people realize today. Franklin Delano Roosevelt became president as the economy sank further and further. His New Deal programs were designed for the three "R"s: relief, recovery, and reform. There were many programs the government rolled out between 1933 and 1938, and those that didn't yield results were dropped, while the most effective survive today. The programs that worked gave us affordable mortgages, electricity in rural areas, the minimum wage and the 44-hour work week (since changed to 40), protections for bank accounts, national park amenities, old age pensions, protection for our natural resources, rules for Wall Street trading, and a lot more. All this required massive government spending, but it got us through the decade. After World War II boosted the American economy into the black, some Depression era programs were considered so important that they were made permanent. Read about those New Deal programs and how they changed America at Mental Floss.

(Image source: Library of Congress)

https://www.neatorama.com/2025/06/06/What-FDRs-New-Deal-Gave-Us/

Neighbor-Source Heat Pump

https://xkcd.com/3099/

The installation of the pipes on the inside of the insulation can be challenging, especially when the neighbor could come home at any minute.

https://xkcd.com/3099/

Absolutely the worst, most insulting sort of shrinkflation

has got to be shrinkflation of dumb phone games.

**********************

( Read more... )

ergh still.

The kitty keeps coming up to me, that's nice. Went for a 2.5 walk, cool. I'd rather be walking now, my chest felt completely calm while I was walking. My bones ache all over, and some slight shoulderness, but it is easily better than the chest pains. It actually does make me wish I had a gym membership a little.

Entry tags:

on pain of pain

[pain] today's articulation

A significant part of the problem is that we only start saying "all pain is in the brain" (or "the tissue isn't the issue" or whatever) to people with complex or chronic pain.

And there's a good reason for that! It's the same reason that I need to have a much more detailed idea of the fine detail of what an atom is and how it behaves than the vast majority of the population, for whom the Bohr model is perfectly adequate!

... and we need to explain that, we need to explain why we don't tell people with simple acute pain that All Pain Is In The Brain -- it's not because it's any less true for them, it's just that for most people most of the time they don't need to worry about that level of detail. But if you don't explain that, it sure do sound a lot like "your pain isn't real (unlike those people over there)".

Lies-to-children. That. That thing. That's a thing I need to explain.

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Ashes of Problem Students

In my first year of teaching, I bought a ceramic jar labeled "Ashes of Problem Students," pictured below, and put it on my desk. On the very first day it was there, one of my freshmen accidentally knocked it onto the floor. It shattered.

I looked at the student. He looked at me. Then I reached into my desk, took out a bottle of white glue, and wordlessly handed it to him. He gathered up the shards and spent the class period gluing them back together. When class ended, he gave the jar back to me and left. Neither of us spoke a word.

The student did a startlingly meticulous repair job. You can't even see the cracks unless you look closely at the inside, also pictured below. The jar held loaner pens and pencils for thirty years. Now it's retired from school and sits on my desk at home.

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Last Day of Instruction

Today was my last day of instruction ever. (Next week we give exams, which is assessment, not instruction.) It was weird. I've taught every lesson for the last time now.

Every year, the first thing I put on the board is the daily schedule. I leave it up until the last day of instruction, which means the dry erase marker has entrenched itself and won't come off unless I use a chemical solvent designed for white boards. Today I sprayed away the daily schedule for the last time.

Ever.

Entry tags:

Wonders never cease

Every afternoon this week, I reach a point in the afternoon where I stumble away from my work computer and end up in the kitchen, and there on the countertop I see a handful (or more!) of strawberries, which V has harvested and washed.

And I try to only eat half (which was easier today because they ended up telling me they'd already eaten half of what they'd picked, and they'd finished off the blueberries in the fridge along with it; basically that was their lunch), and it's just the thing I need to get through the rest of the day.

Strawberry season is the best season. And I'm so grateful that don't even have to pick them myself!

Ergh.

The internet won't connect in a way that deleted my entire post just now, so let me just remain in detention here.

The police keep showing up when I go for walks. A guy on a scooter came within 2 feet of me zooming by. The police have arrested me, so no trust there. I am regularly dealing with chest pains. I have chest pains even when I am laying down sometimes, and going for walks is supposed to be helpful, why are the police harassing me for trying to stay healthy?

The police obviously are viewing their job as to harass disabled people.

I got some very nice stuff to work with, so at least that is nice, but I'm tired of chest pains. I have another doctor's appointment next week, so... something to look forward to? This is a horrible life, and admitting that definitely doesn't make me mentally ill. If you get heart surgery, you are going to have a bad time. That's not mental illness, it's physical illness.

Earth's atmosphere hasn't had this much CO2 in millions of years

https://www.nbcnews.com/science/climate-change/earth-co2-record-global-warming-rcna210974?ref=themorningnews.org&utm_source=DamnInteresting

Earth's atmosphere hasn't had this much CO2 in millions of years (from nbcnews.com)

https://www.nbcnews.com/science/climate-change/earth-co2-record-global-warming-rcna210974?ref=themorningnews.org&utm_source=DamnInteresting

On this day in 1989, Soviet scientists reached the deepest point ever drilled into the Earth

https://www.damninteresting.com/the-deepest-hole/?date=2025-06-06&utm_source=DamnInteresting

On this day in 1989, Soviet scientists reached the deepest point ever drilled into the Earth (from damninteresting.com)

https://www.damninteresting.com/the-deepest-hole/?date=2025-06-06&utm_source=DamnInteresting

Private Japanese spacecraft crashes into moon in 'hard landing,' ispace says

https://www.space.com/astronomy/moon/private-japanese-spacecraft-resilience-ispace-moon-landing-attempt?utm_source=DamnInteresting

Private Japanese spacecraft crashes into moon in 'hard landing,' ispace says (from space.com)

https://www.space.com/astronomy/moon/private-japanese-spacecraft-resilience-ispace-moon-landing-attempt?utm_source=DamnInteresting

First Map Made of a Solid’s Secret Quantum Geometry

https://www.quantamagazine.org/first-map-made-of-a-solids-secret-quantum-geometry-20250606/?utm_source=DamnInteresting

First Map Made of a Solid’s Secret Quantum Geometry (from quantamagazine.org)

https://www.quantamagazine.org/first-map-made-of-a-solids-secret-quantum-geometry-20250606/?utm_source=DamnInteresting

Ed Gein's Really Messed-up Childhood

Posted by Miss Cellania

https://www.neatorama.com/2025/06/06/Ed-Geins-Really-Messed-up-Childhood/

You know of Ed Gein, even if you were never sure how to pronounce his name. He was a serial killer who inspired numerous cinematic killers such as Buffalo Bill, Norman Bates, Leatherface, and a bunch of other movie characters, including himself. In 1957, investigators searched Gein's home and found bodies and body parts of numerous people in various stages of dismemberment. Gein was trying to make a suit out of human skin that he could wear and become his mother. He had exhumed most of them from graveyards, but confessed to two murders. Gein was convicted of one murder and is suspected to be behind many other cases of missing persons around Plainfield, Wisconsin. He spent the rest of his life in a mental institution.

You can read about Gein's crimes in many places, but you also have to wonder, what could have led to Gein's twisted view of the world and of the people he treated so carelessly? Weird History focuses on his early life with his parents, and uncovers a story that can best be described as "how not to raise children." It's no excuse for his actions, but it is another horror story connected with Gein.

https://www.neatorama.com/2025/06/06/Ed-Geins-Really-Messed-up-Childhood/

Entry tags:

illness

The Sickening Has Me

I spent the day feeling bad for lacking focus, and wondering why I couldn't get anything done.
And then I slept for an hour on no notice.
And now I'm very wobbly and all of my muscles gently ache.
So I think I'm going to chalk it up as "The Plague" and hope I feel better tomorrow.

The Venetian Islands For Those Suffering Pellagrous Insanity

Posted by Miss Cellania

https://www.neatorama.com/2025/06/06/The-Venetian-Islands-For-Those-Suffering-Pellagrous-Insanity/

When Europeans colonized the Americas, they found corn, an easily-grown and inexpensive grain. Eventually, many of the poorest people in Europe were eating little besides corn, made into polenta in Italy, and began to suffer from a disease called pellagra. For hundreds of years, no one knew what caused pellagra, but some suspected it was caused by a fungus or insects associated with corn. Only in the 1920s did they realize it was a nutritional deficiency, and in the '30s it was found to be a lack of niacin (vitamin B3). The poor folks who consumed mostly polenta suffered from skin rashes and diarrhea, and if it went untreated, they developed dementia, called pellagrous insanity.

During those hundreds of years, Italian sufferers could end up at San Servolo or San Clemente, two islands off of Venice with hospitals for the mentally ill. Treatment of these inmates varied according to their social status and the medical philosophy of those in charge of the hospitals. It took way too long for authorities to figure out why an improved diet would "cure" individuals, only for them to return later after eating little besides polenta in their home towns. Read about the mental hospitals of San Servolo and San Clemente at Smithsonian.

(Image credit: Kasa Fue)

https://www.neatorama.com/2025/06/06/The-Venetian-Islands-For-Those-Suffering-Pellagrous-Insanity/

Current Mood: amused

If I could...

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