Lightnews — Scholar-powered news

Linnaeus @linnaeus.bsky.social · 9h

If you ever decide to sell merch, I’d get in line for a Fork Fight tee. Seems like it would make a good pajama top. :)

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Linnaeus @linnaeus.bsky.social · 10h

So many compelling ways to read this sentence depending on which word you put emphasis on.

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Linnaeus @linnaeus.bsky.social · 12h

For the most part something bare bones would be fine, but when I try to see what I’d need if I suddenly found myself with free time and wanted to play a game that doesn’t involve crushing candy or w/ever, the internet starts acting like performance car reviewers with strong opinions on BMW vs Lexus.

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Linnaeus @linnaeus.bsky.social · 12h

I want to get a Windows laptop for general personal business use. I’m willing to spend a bit more for something that can do some light gaming (WoW? Various things on Steam? HoI4?) but I never actually find time to do these, so it’s not worth getting something ridiculously powerful. Recommendations?

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Linnaeus @linnaeus.bsky.social · 13h

The Skin Deep crew rolls deep, I’m always grateful to get to spend more time with the many cool supporting characters. :)

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Linnaeus @linnaeus.bsky.social · 15h

Are there any of my fellow map nerds in the Chicago area who’d like to get together and check this out sometime between tomorrow and 2/14/2026?

Suzanne Karr Schmidt @drkarrschmidt.bsky.social · 16h

Can't contain how much you LOVE Maps?

We're getting a real treat ready for you at #NewberryLibrary! "Mapping Outside the Lines" opens tomorrow!

It's curated by Dave Weimer, more info here:
www.newberry.org/calendar/map...
1/?

Exhibition door with geode looking diagram vinyl of white wiggly lines going up on the left side.

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Linnaeus @linnaeus.bsky.social · 1d

Sammy Davis Jr., exulting in the Las Vegasness of the mural he is a part of, on the side of a motel or something that looks like it’s about to be torn down.

A mural on the side of a building that looks like a motel or apartment building along a busy road with two stories of external doors, depicting a smiling Sammy Davis Jr, his arms spread wide, along with some palm trees and flamboyantly dressed showgirls. There is temporary chain link fencing blocking off access to the building’s parking lot.

Linnaeus @linnaeus.bsky.social · 1d

What’s the point of even having a bird mascot if they don’t have skinny yellow or orange legs?

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Linnaeus @linnaeus.bsky.social · 1d

Kid gets nosebleeds from time to time, and we’ve had luck with a product made of absorbent fiber with a clotting agent. They work pretty well, but are unfortunately called “Nampons”. I’m not squeamish about menstrual stuff, but it feels weird to call something I’m sticking in a 9 year old’s nose.

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Linnaeus @linnaeus.bsky.social · 1d

Ah, right!

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Linnaeus @linnaeus.bsky.social · 2d

Among some papers from a trip to Washington DC back in the early ‘80s, I found an empty freeze dried ice cream package. Note the aggressively non-metric package info, the inexplicable quotes around “Do not open in the museum”, and “SPACESNAK” in that retrofuturistic Westminster typeface.

A flat empty foil bag that contained freeze dried astronaut ice cream from the National Air and Space Museum. It’s over 40 years old. Net weight is listed as 5/8 Oz. It has art of a Project Mercury space capsule.

The reverse of the foil bag, with the text:

ASTRONAUT ICE CREAM
A delicious ready-to-eat assortment of freeze-dried strawberry, chocolate and vanilla ice cream that melts in your mouth.
Freeze-dried ice cream similar to this was enjoyed by U.S. Astronauts on the Apollo mis-sions. It is real ice cream frozen to -40°F (-40°C), vacuum-dried and sealed in a mylar foil pouch.
Artificially Flavored Vanilla, Chocolate & Strawberry
Packed For
National Air and Space Museum, Smithsonian Institution, Washington, D.C.
Innovative Foods, Inc.
So. San Francisco, CA. 94080

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Linnaeus @linnaeus.bsky.social · 2d

Some quick scratch paper math indicates that a Walmart Supercenter & parking lot, at about 700k sq ft, would still take up 40” by 40” at T scale. So I guess you’d have to have a really big basement and really love Walmarts.

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Linnaeus @linnaeus.bsky.social · 2d

Model railroading is inherently urbanist because who has the space at HO (1:87) or even N (1:220) scale to include big box stores with giant parking lots in their setups. But I wonder if anyone is using T (1:450) scale to replicate the retail sprawl of the US suburbs?

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Linnaeus @linnaeus.bsky.social · 2d

We’ve established through her past two appointments that Giant Dog is very nervous at the veterinarian and will pee all over the floor and herself while being examined. So a stop at the self service dog wash on the way home is just part of the routine now I guess.

A blue Great Dane in a shower stall in the midst of getting a bath. She is looking directly at the camera, panting. She’s had kind of a rough hour or so, but will be receiving treats soon.

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Reposted by Linnaeus

Deanna Kreisel 🌱 @doctorwaffle.substack.com · 6d

In honor of National Poetry Day, the greatest parody rewrite of all time:

Screen cap of parodic version of William Blake's "The Tyger" that begins:
Tyger! Tyger! Burning bright
(Not sure if I spelled that right)
What immortal hand or eye
Could fashion such a stripy guy?
What the hammer that hath hewn it
Into such a chonky unit?
Did who made the lamb make thee,
Or an external franchisee?

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Linnaeus @linnaeus.bsky.social · 3d

Okay sure, Halloween werewolf packaging. But they’re gummy *worms* so it should be a really scary looking thing that eats worms. Maybe a wererobin or a weremole. Some of those star-nosed moles look pretty terrifying.

A package of gummy worms with a cartoon werewolf holding fistfuls of gummy worms and looking hungrily at them.

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Linnaeus @linnaeus.bsky.social · 3d

I first heard about it Thursday from a coworker with middle school age school aged kids, she said “I’m so sick of 6-7”. I asked the Kid if he’d heard of 6-7 & he said “Ugh, I’m so sick of that”. I guess it’s a random memey reference to a Skrilla song called “Doot Doot (6 7)” w/out any real meaning

Reposted by Linnaeus

Wil Wheaton @wilwheaton.net · 4d

If you can hear this image, it's probably time to schedule your colonoscopy. If you can sing the whole song, it's also time to get your shingles vaccine.

Time for Timer on a red background. Next to him, the phrase "When my get-up-and-go has got up and went, I hanker for a Hunk O' Cheese!"

He looks at you with this blank stare, daring you to tell him you tried to make sunshine on a stick in the freezer but the toothpicks never stayed up straight. He knows you won't say anything because you're embarrassed. You know he knows. He knows that you know that he knows. And yet, he just stands there, hankering for a hunk o' cheese like it isn't fucking impossible to get plastic wrap to stay taught on an ice cube tray.

You want to ask him for a wagon wheel, from his stacks of snacks, but you can't bring yourself to say the words, because now you, too, are hankering, hankering for the last hunk-o-cheese, and you both know you'll have to fight for it.

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Linnaeus @linnaeus.bsky.social · 4d

It’s sad and comforting when attending a memorial, even a streamed Second Life one, to learn there was a lot more to the departed than you knew. Sad that you missed out on so much about them, but comforting to know that their life was full. Miss you Karl, sorry I didn’t stay in better touch.

hartreefox.bsky.social @hartreefox.bsky.social · 4d

Sorry for the short notice, but I just received this:

The online memorial service for Karl Meyer (Crim Mip) on Second Life will be livestreamed at: www.youtube.com/live/aTMyOYw...

I believe this is California time so this will be 4 PM Central today.

Celebrating Crim Mip Memorial Service

www.youtube.com

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Linnaeus @linnaeus.bsky.social · 5d

Fuck. :( Sorry to hear it, hoping you bounce back to something better soon.

Linnaeus @linnaeus.bsky.social · 5d

I feel like boob windows on hazmat suits aren’t a great idea, for humans or cows.

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Linnaeus @linnaeus.bsky.social · 5d

Happy birthday!

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Linnaeus @linnaeus.bsky.social · 6d

That’s just from all the microplastics you’ve been eating your whole life. Everyone’s is like that now.

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Linnaeus @linnaeus.bsky.social · 6d

I keep seeing this billboard for a local health care provider along the interstate but never close enough to get a good picture so this one will have to do. The guy gesturing toward his chest seems to be saying “Can uh… can you put it back in?”

A billboard showing a woman in a lab coat holding what appears to be a human heart, showing it to an older man who is wearing a concerned expression and is gesturing toward his own chest.

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Linnaeus @linnaeus.bsky.social · 7d

*sigh* “Sometimes…”

Coffeemancer Vanvidum @vanvidum.bsky.social · 7d

"Don't you ever get tired of being wrong all the time?"

Willow @rockshrimp.bsky.social · 7d

what's the stupidest/randomest Simpsons quote that lives in your head rent free? Mine is the urge to say "you said go to bread" every time I am about to head to bed.

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