• That’s a Sweet Face

    a close photo of a mini goldendoodle's face
  • Living in The Upside Down

    Auto-generated description: A person is sitting on a white couch in a modern outdoor setting, with text discussing a crypto billionaire's return to the U.S. for dinner with Trump.

    From the WSJ. Presented without comment.


  • Ange

    I now think that Ange should stay at Spurs because the players are so solidly behind him. Canning him would gut the team and kill the very non-Spursy mentality that he’s cultivated. It’s an ethos that won them a trophy and can pay dividends for years to come.


  • Oh, Mickey, You’re So Fine

    Auto-generated description: A soccer player in a white and navy kit performs an acrobatic kick near the goal net in a stadium. ⚽️


  • COYS

    I don’t usually win things, I always win things in my second year.

    – Ange Postecoglou


  • Not Too Much

    Another thing I like about Micro.blog: by following a limited number of posters, I see all new posts in pretty short order. Which means I can put away my screen and get back to non-screen living in pretty short order. (If I do want more MB, I can always tap “Discover.")


  • Very Cosmospolitan

    Bright orange Cosmos flowers bloom among lush green foliage.

    Cosmos


  • “Chaste Tree?” Ha!

    Purple flowers are blooming on a lush green bush in a garden setting, surrounded by a wooden fence and additional potted pink flowers.

    “Floozy Tree,” more like. I love her.


  • “Circus Dogs”

    Auto-generated description: Several puppies are gathered around a drum, with one sitting on top of it, in a dimly lit setting.

    This painting hung in my mom and dad’s house for 60 years or more. Now it’s my sister’s. Artist unknown. I love it. 🐶


  • Tù Importas. Y el Desayuno es Importante, tambien

    Joe’s Bakery, East Austin. Get the Migas con Todo.

    Auto-generated description: A colorful mural features the text TÚ IMPORTAS with butterflies and flowers, and includes the message YOU MATTER MENTAL HEALTH MATTERS.
  • Not a Bug

    Nicholas Carr:

    Through their ever-flowing stream of messages, each offering a simulation of connection, social platforms promise to alleviate the sense of loneliness they provoke. Turning social interactions into symbolic transactions, they reconstruct society on a foundation of anomie. Bots fit seamlessly into such a society, upping the monetization potential substantially.

    When Facebook’s News Feed introduced us to what Zuckerberg termed “frictionless sharing,” we learned, or should have learned, that friction is the essence of sharing. Freed of any investment of effort, time, or care, sharing loses all meaning. It becomes mere transmission. The frictionless friendship offered by chatbots, by removing the need to adapt one’s self to another self, to make room in one’s life for a different being, will be similarly empty.


  • Birnam (yawn) Wood  by Elizabeth Catton

    Good guys and bad guys in New Zealand. Catton’s deft writing of her good guys' interior lives reveals how noble aims often come bundled with not-so-noble motives. But her bad guy is simply bad. Nothing mixed about him. Too bad – for both the character and the novel.📚


  • What’s the over/under on how long it will take Trump to take credit for an American pope?


  • Yay Seasons!

    Just saw the first lightning bug of 2025. Hooray!


  • American Ideals

    Danielle Allen contra Curtis Yarvin:

    He gets his first principles wrong, so we have to return to ours. Most important, human equality precedes human differences. We can identify differences among us only because we are all human, and in that regard equal. As humans we share a capacity for moral judgment and an innate striving to choose actions that make tomorrow better. This is how our drive and capacity for freedom show themselves.

    The proposition that all humans are created equal has never meant that we are all the same. Our equality lies in these features of humanity that make us moral beings. Nor does human difference yield fixed and permanent groupings or determine where and how human talent in its immense variety will show itself. The government that will best help humans flourish will start by protecting human freedom. This requires maximal space for self-government, and also government of the whole people that is by and for the people. Not in the interest of those who govern, but in the interest of the governed.

    * * *

    If our constitutional democracy is weak today—failing to help us meet our governing challenges—that may be because we have lapsed in civic participation. We have ceased to claim our own equality through our institutions, which offer it. We have allowed political parties to capture our institutions, and to govern for their own sake rather than the public good. We need to renovate our democratic institutions, starting with party reform.

    But our more basic work may need to be on ourselves. Here Mr. Yarvin’s words are a warning: “Americans of the present are nihilistic and narcissistic,” he writes. “They are frivolous about the present and ignorant of the past. While these qualities may not make the Americans of today suitable for an 18th-century democracy, they may be just the right qualities for a 21st-century regime change.”

    We don’t need his regime change. We need democracy renovation and renewed seriousness about our lives as citizens. This means reconnecting to our civic power, experience and responsibility. This requires civic practice and education. It also means redesigning institutions so they reward participation and deliver effective governance. We need to understand why and how separation of powers, checks and balances, due process, and a national legislature that functions are necessary to protect human freedom.


  • Feed Animals in the Zoo

    Just a perfect day.


  • David French

    According to this narrative, the Supreme Court’s decision in Roe v. Wade in 1973 was the seminal domestic event that inspired Christian conservatism. It represented a deadly corruption of our Constitution in service of a culture of sexual convenience in which human life was subordinate to sexual pleasure.

    The response of the Christian right was both political and personal. That approach could be boiled down to a single sentence: Elect people of good personal character who will defend human life and religious liberty.

    We went on that trip, and all we got was this lousy Trump.


  • Willie

    Happy Birthday to this fine fellow.


  • None Better

    Auto-generated description: A person, likely portrayed in black and white, is looking upward with a serious expression. Auto-generated description: A woman is captured in a black-and-white image, looking off to the side with a thoughtful expression, and wearing a headscarf.


  • God Bless Alejandro Escovedo

    Velvet Guitar


  • St. Fiacre of the Oregano (and Parsley and Nasturtiums)

    Auto-generated description: A stone statue of a bearded monk holding a rabbit and shovel stands amidst lush greenery and plants.
  • I’m sorry; what?


  • Easter in Brooklyn

    St. John’s Park Slope: wonderful! Alleluia! The Lord is risen!


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