Things you don’t like to come home to: a backhoe parked on the grass and an 8 foot deep trench dug in the yard.

We noticed with the spring thaw that we were building a lovely swamp in the yard — we had a constant leak from the water main feeding our house. The only way to deal with it was to bring in the heavy equipment, excavate the pipe, and replace the leaky broken bit. I think I’m going waterless tonight, but they think it will be fixed tomorrow morning.

AI spills the beans. An alternative to humanity is being developed from mouse stock.

You should feel guilty if you put out mouse traps and squish those mega-brains.

For those who care, I’ve switched my Mastodon server. I’m now @[email protected].

HJ Hornbeck set this up for us a few years ago, but I didn’t bother to move at the time, but now I’ve made the shift. This server has been open for business for a while now, and is currently kind of empty (it’s me and HJ), but if anyone else is looking for a Mastodon instance to try out, come on over.

You may not be interested, but I passed my physical exam. Blood pressure is perfect, cholesterol levels are so low the doctor has cut my statin dosage in half, I’ve apparently got the healthy body of a 67 year old.

I even got a perfect score on the cognitive test, which means I’m at least as smart as Donald Trump. My annual performance review is coming up this month, I’m planning to tell the university that my doctor said I was cognitively flawless, so gimme a raise. At the very least, I’m going to brag to everyone that I remembered “apple, penny, table” for a whole couple of minutes. Like I’m doing right here.

I also got a couple of vaccines, one for tetanus, another for pneumonia. My immune system is now mighty.

Today is the day for my annual physical exam, and I’m about to get my veins tapped and my body poked and get informed about my bad habits and told about my imminent doom. It’s going to take a while. Then I have to rush back for multiple appointments with students and to teach a couple of classes.

So today is filmstrip day! Is anyone else old enough to remember when the teacher was hung over and just wheeled in the machine that would show a series of still images with voiceover so they could retreat into a back corner and close their eyes for a while?

That might be the same people who remember who Al Gore was.

We were hit by a snowstorm this past weekend, but it’s now melting away fast. We can’t get too excited yet, because apparently another storm is supposed to brush by us this week.

We’ve had a few flowering plants that brave the whole winter, and this what they look like right now.

Here’s what they looked like last summer.

Maybe when they stop looking so skeletal and dead, the spiders will come back.

As seen on Discord: Lockheed Martin Develops Giant Tactical Rubber Spider.

Although…I notice they don’t include a price tag. Lockheed Martin wouldn’t gouge their customers with grossly inflated prices, would they?

Yesterday, I left my coat at home and went for a brisk walk downtown, which left me sweating. It felt like a nice warm spring.

Tomorrow, all the students will be returning from spring break, all tanned and rested and ready to work.

So what happens today? I was awakened to the sound of sleet and wind rattling the windows, and went to look out and see what’s going on. This is what I saw.

The windows are all glazed with ice. There is a nice foundation layer of ice on the ground, with snow coming down on top of that, wind blowing it everywhere. We’ve got weather warnings about whiteout conditions.

Drive safe, students! I guess I’ll have to prepare my planned lecture so I can deliver it over zoom. It’s not as if I’m going anywhere today, I’m just going to hunker down and work from home anyway.

Lately, I’ve been getting up in the morning and glancing briefly at the news. More tariffs; we’re in an unnecessary trade war with our allies. The US is breaking climate agreements right and left. The Trump administration is unconstitutionally throwing out the principle of free speech, and has arrested Mahmoud Khalil for the ‘crime’ of legal protest. Trump is using “Palestinian” as a slur. DOGE has slashed $800 million from Johns Hopkins’ research funding. The president of the US just made a commercial for Tesla cars.

It’s overwhelming.

I don’t want to know more, unless someone has a suggestion for how I can contribute to the overthrow of the American government.

In lieu of that, I’ve got a lot to do in the lab.

I’m autoclaving fly bottles in preparationg for the next cross we do when the students get back.

I’m doing the next step in the cross for all the students. The fly breeding goes on even if the students are away on spring break!

I’m making these adorable wooden platforms for my spider cages. I’m going to be recording spider behavior, and I want them to be building cobwebs in the horizontal plane.

I’ve got an exam I’ve put off grading.

I have to do some critical reviews of student paper summaries.

The students have been working on a major lab report. I have to look over their methods section.

By the weekend, I have to get next week’s lectures prepared.

I’ve been trying to schedule an hour of light exercise every day. Easy to do over spring break, my plans will fall apart when classes start.

I have to spend at least an hour in bed tonight overcome with general feelings of dread and anxiety.

I’ve got stuff to do while the country swirls down the drain!