In the summer of 2017, an anonymous tipster informed me of a small network of online propagandists orchestrating troll campaigns and creating memes to support Donald Trump. They gathered on Discord, a text-, voice-, and video-chat platform popular with gamers. I signed up and lurked on their server, observing various green-frog and American-flag avatars hurling insults, posting rudimentary Photoshops of Trump, and daydreaming about undertaking outrageous missions such as trying to infiltrate CNN’s New York headquarters.Initially, the posts unnerved me, but there was also something unserious about them—an oblivious, naive enthusiasm coupled with a grand delusion that their pixelated memes had fully shifted the political landscape. The reason for the bluster was quickly made clear when one of the server’s...
The end of the school year is the perfect time to celebrate all your students’ hard work! I love using this End of the Year Alphabet Countdown Calendar as a fun way to finish the year! Wrap up the last 26 days of the school with a fun activity for each day! The calendar I’m sharing has a theme for each day that starts with the alphabet letter. It starts with A and ends with Z! I also have an editable calendar, where you can use my template to create your own ABC countdown calendar! You’ll find the PDF at the bottom of this post. Here are some ideas you can do for each letter! Letter A – animals –...
This Earth Day, we have much to be thankful for. The serendipitously wet winter California experienced this year has officially moved Sonoma County out of a years-long drought — and locals can reap the rewards this spring. Vibrant flower blooms, bountiful farmers markets and hikes through lush green forests. The earth gives back in glorious ways, so it’s only fitting we pay it forward by caring for our local lands however we can. Local cities, nonprofits and businesses have a variety of ways to honor Earth Day this year while making a positive impact. From eco-friendly festivals to volunteer work at cherished community parks, here’s how to celebrate Earth Day in Sonoma County. Events Students for Sustainability Club Earth Day...
From Zdeněk Miler’s “Krtek a maminka.” Guild loyalty says I should probably choose a work of fiction for my favorite recent book, but I’m not sure that anyone, with the exception of Octavia Butler, could serve up as glorious a museum of the unimaginable as Charley Eiseman and Noah Charney do in Tracks & Sign of Insects and Other Invertebrates: A Guide to North American Species. Have you ever seen a spongilla fly cocoon (silk lozenge, haloed in a lacy mesh of bridal finery)? How about neatly-ranged eggs laid by a katydid along a blade of grass? I had thought myself well-versed in the range of parasitic terrors until I saw the work of a mummy wasp upon a sphinx...
If you’ve never kept goats before, you’re probably in for a bit of a rude awakening: these adventurous little critters are escape artists to the core, take my word for it. And if you don’t believe me, just ask anybody who has kept them for any length of time and they will back me up. four goats on the homestead The problem with raising goats is that aside from being pretty athletic and capable jumpers, they are also really hard on fencing. If there is any weakness, any gap, any shortcoming in the design, they will find it, exploit it and take off. The problem is one that is maddening enough many people swear off owning goats after a year...
