Friday, August 19, 2016

Weekend Reading: The Week Goes Fast Edition

Our week without kids is almost over. It has been really nice, but I am looking forward to seeing my kids on Sunday. There have been many meals out without a single thought as to whether or not the restaurant has any menu items my children will eat, and that alone has been great. There was also some kayaking time and some lazy around the house time, and those were both great, too.

What was not so great was the visual migraine I got yesterday that screwed up my plans for the day, and made us decide to cancel the planned rollerblade today. Probably, the rollerblade would have been fine. Oh well.

Between the visual migraine (which makes it essentially impossible to look at a screen) and a general focus on spending time with Mr. Snarky, I don't have all that many links this week. But, as always, I think what I do have is good.

Here's an interesting but somewhat superficial piece about racism and mental health. I guess superficial is a bit unfair. It is good for what it is, but I wanted it to go deeper. I've long been curious about the impact of experiencing bias on mental health. I've also wondered if there are mental health providers out there who specialize in helping professionals who have cracked or are starting to crack under the pressure of bias.

Speaking of bias... this open letter to managers of women hits very, very close to home.

Think about bias as pollution... that will destroy your company.

I'm late to this one, but Michelle A'Court's open letter to Saatchi's Kevin Roberts is really good.

Sara Benincasa's answer to a reader who wrote to ask why she is fat is also really good. I think I should perhaps read her book.

This article from Emily Deruy about racism on campus is unusually good.  Here's the take home quote, which appears to be a paraphrase of something Tressie McMillan Cottom said when interviewed for the piece: "being safely uncomfortable in class is entirely different from being safely uncomfortable on campus."

I think that quote speaks to a lot of contexts away from higher ed, too.

Josh Marshall's thoughts on the ads and the demise of Gawker and the importance of independent media are really worth your time.

Timothy Lee manages to make the roomba vs. dog poo story about something more than schadenfreude.

Could we make affordable housing vouchers more like food stamps? And here's a look at the failure of Section 8 in San Diego.

This conversation between Dan Pink and Amy Herman about the art of observation was really interesting. Plus there are pictures of some cool art.

Ann Friedman on female olympians is very good. I have noticed that all of the people who are snarking about the story of the two runners who fell are men, and this is making me think that perhaps some men don't realize that there is more to sport than pure competition, or at least that there can be.  It has also given me some ideas about how to frame events that involve an aspect of competition for competition-adverse Pumpkin. If it is about something more than winning and losing, maybe that will help. My thoughts are still coalescing on this one.

I am absolutely going to try Smitten Kitchen's quick zucchini saute.

I don't have a funny to end on! But I do have this:


3 comments:

  1. Migraines suck. Here is a post I came across in my feeds - http://lovelybike.blogspot.com/2016/08/electrolytes-and-migraine-accidental.html at lovely bicycle - just in case you had not tried it, and in case it might help....

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    1. Thanks! Electrolytes is as good a theory as any, and one I can actually act on, so I may give it a try. The other leading theory is hormones, and there's not much I can do about those.

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    2. I get migrainous headaches (never been formally diagnosed as a migraine, but they fit the descriptions right down to the auras, puking and post-migraine-syndrome) and have discovered that drinking a rehydration-beverage as soon as I start to get the warning symptoms can prevent the full thing developing about two-thirds of the time. And I haven't really changed anything else, so would definitely second trying it out. Not much to lose if it doesn't help you.

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