Wandering Scientist: Weekend Reading: The Sick Kid Edition

Friday, August 17, 2018

Weekend Reading: The Sick Kid Edition

Here it is, Friday already. I have spent the last two days working at home with a sick eight year old. It has gone better than I expected and reminds me once again of how some aspects of parenting do indeed get easier as the kids get older. Petunia has been prone to fevers since she was a baby. As a baby, toddler, preschooler, and even kindergartner, one of her fevers usually meant that an adult needed to spend three days on the sofa with her, comforting her. Now, she may spend three days on the sofa (we are on day two, and she is up and about working on a cardboard space console inspired by a Doc McStuffins episode), but I have only been required to come cuddle intermittently.

Of course, we had plans to go do fun things last night and tonight, and both of those had to be canceled. But at least I didn't have to take a sick day.

Despite the higher than usual amount of time I spent sitting on the sofa, I don't have a lot of links for you. Here's what I have:

I think Josh Marshall has this right: It is obvious Trump is guilty. I think that a lot of people are trying not to acknowledge that right now because to acknowledge it would require also acknowledging how poorly Congressional Republicans are behaving.

This is cool: PBS has a map of gender diverse cultures.

Ezra Klein's interview with Zeynep Tufekci about how online algorithms push us to the extremes is really, really good. I really like her point about setting up the default to push us towards healthier behaviors, and am thinking about ways to implement that idea in my own life while we work towards healthier defaults on a larger scale.

LOL:

It's weird that ppl interpret the moral of The Pied Piper story as "Don't trust strangers" when really it's "Always pay freelancers"
— Meagan (@meagantrott) August 12, 2018