[PHOTO] Detail, charcuterie board, Bandit Brewery

[PHOTO] No rules (?) (#coronavirustoronto)

I joked yesterday, eating a bowl of Kellogg’s Eggo cereal with Maple Syrup, that there were no rules now.

There are, of course. It is just a matter of figuring out what, exactly, these rules are.

[NEWS] Twenty news links

• NOW Toronto looks at the Pickering nuclear plant and its role in providing fuel for space travel.
• In some places like California, traffic is so bad that airlines actually play a role for high-end commuters. CBC reports.
• Goldfish released into the wild are a major issue for the environment in Québec, too. CTV News reports.
• China’s investments in Jamaica have good sides and bad sides. CBC reports.
• A potato museum in Peru might help solve world hunger. The Guardian reports.
• Is the Alberta-Saskatchewan alliance going to be a lasting one? Maclean’s considers.
• Is the fossil fuel industry collapsing? The Tyee makes the case.
• Should Japan and Europe co-finance a EUrasia trade initiative to rival China’s? Bloomberg argues.
• Should websites receive protection as historically significant? VICE reports.
• Food tourism in the Maritimes is a very good idea. Global News reports.
• Atlantic Canada lobster exports to China thrive as New England gets hit by the trade war. CBC reports.
• The Bloc Québécois experienced its revival by drawing on the same demographics as the provincial CAQ. Maclean’s reports.
• Population density is a factor that, in Canada, determines political issues, splitting urban and rural voters. The National Observer observes.
• US border policies aimed against migration from Mexico have been harming businesses on the border with Canada. The National Post reports.
• The warming of the ocean is changing the relationship of coastal communities with their seas. The Conversation looks.
• Archival research in the digital age differs from what occurred in previous eras. The Conversation explains.
• The Persian-language Wikipedia is an actively contested space. Open Democracy reports.
• Vox notes how the US labour shortage has been driven partly by workers quitting the labour force, here.
• Laurie Penny at WIRED has a stirring essay about hope, about the belief in some sort of future.

[BLOG] Some Monday links

• Anthropology.net notes a remarkably thorough genetic analysis of a piece of chewing gum 5700 years old that reveals volumes of data about the girl who chew it.
• ‘Nathan Burgoine at Apostrophen writes an amazing review of Cats that actually does make me want to see it.
• Bad Astronomy reports on galaxy NGC 6240, a galaxy produced by a collision with three supermassive black holes.
• Caitlin Kelly at the Broadside Blog writes about the mechanics of journalism.
• Centauri Dreams argues that the question of whether humans will walk on exoplanets is ultimately distracting to the study of these worlds.
• Crooked Timber shares a Sunday morning photo of Bristol.
• The Dragon’s Tales notes that India has a launch date of December 2021 for its first mission in its Gaganyaan crewed space program.
• Andrew LePage at Drew Ex Machina looks at the Saturn C-1 rocket.
• Karen Sternheimer at the Everyday Sociology Blog considers if the vogue for minimalism meets the criteria to be considered a social movement.
• Far Outliers ?notes how, in the War of 1812, some in New England considered the possibility of seceding from the Union.
• Gizmodo looks at evidence of the last populations known of Homo erectus, on Java just over a hundred thousand years ago.
• Mark Graham links to a new paper co-authored by him looking at how African workers deal with the gig economy.
• io9 announces that the Michael Chabon novel, The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier and Clay, is set to become a television series.
• Joe. My. God. shares a report that Putin gave Trump anti-Ukrainian conspiracy theories.
• JSTOR Daily considers what a world with an economy no longer structured around oil could look like.
• Language Hat takes issue with the latest talk of the Icelandic language facing extinction.
• Language Log shares a multilingual sign photographed in Philadelphia’s Chinatown.
• Paul Campos at Lawyers, Guns and Money notes the document release revealing the futility of the war in Afghanistan.
• The LRB Blog looks at class identity and mass movements and social democracy.
• Tyler Cowen at Marginal Revolution suggests that, even if the economy of China is larger than the United States, Chinese per capita poverty means China does not have the leading economy.
• Diane Duane at Out of Ambit writes about how she is writing a gay sex scene.
• Jim Belshaw at Personal Reflections reflects on “OK Boomer”.
• Roads and Kingdoms interviews Mexican chef Ruffo Ibarra.
• Peter Rukavina shares his list of levees for New Year’s Day 2020 on PEI.
• The Russian Demographics Blog shares a map indicating fertility rates in the different regions of the European Union.
• Starts With A Bang’s Ethan Siegel explains how quantum physics are responsible for vast cosmic structures.
• Charles Soule at Whatever explains his reasoning behind his new body-swap novel.
• Window on Eurasia notes how the negotiations between Russia and Ukraine in Paris show the lack of meaningful pro-Russian sentiment there.
• Yorkshire Ranter Alex Harrowell talks about his lessons from working in the recent British election.
• Arnold Zwicky looks at a syncretic, Jewish-Jedi, holiday poster.

[NEWS] Fourteen links

• By at least one metric, New Brunswick now lags economically behind a more dynamic Prince Edward Island. CBC reports.
• NOW Toronto looks at toxic fandoms. (“Stanning” sounds really creepy to me.)
• This CityLab article looks at how the particular characteristics of Japan, including its high population density, helps keep alive there retail chains that have failed in the US.
• MacLean’s looks at Kent Monkman, enjoying a new level of success with his diptych Mistikôsiwak at the Met in NYC.
• Can there be something that can be said for the idea of an Internet more strongly pillarized? Wired argues.
• I reject utterly the idea of meaningful similarities between Drake and Leonard Cohen. CBC did it.
• Toronto Life looks at the life of a Hamilton woman hurt badly by the cancellation of the basic income pilot, here.
• Inspired by the death of Gord Downie, Ontario now has the office of poet-laureate. CBC reports.
• Is Canada at risk, like Ireland, of experiencing two-tier health care? CBC considers.
• A French immigrant couple has brought the art of artisanal vinegar to ile d’Orléans. CBC reports.
• Shore erosion is complicating the lives of people along Lake Erie. CBC reports.
• MacLean’s notes how Via Rail making it difficult for people without credit cards to buy anything on their trains, hurting many.
• Michelle Legro notes at Gen that the 2010s is the decade where conspiracy culture became mainstream.
• This essay by Robert Greene at his blog talking about what history, and historians, can do in our era is thought-provoking.

[URBAN NOTE] Six Toronto links

• Google has apologized for the negative shade its image search cast on Scarborough with a Twitter thread. Global News reports.
• The National Post looks at the story of the architecturally remarkable Integral House, on sale for $C 21.5 million.
• South Indian Dosa Mahal, a beloved Bloordale restaurant apparently displaced by landlords, has found a new home. blogTO reports.
• The infamous Parkdale McDonald, at King and Dufferin, has officially been closed down, relocated. blogTO reports.
• The Ontario Cannabis Store is experimenting with a same-day delivery program. NOW Toronto reports.
• Lia Grainger writes at NOW Toronto about how poor city planning has resulted in multiple dangerous intersections. (I know of two in my broader neighbourhood.)

[BLOG] Some Tuesday links

• Bad Astronomy’s Phil Plait shares a stunning photo taken by a friend of the Pleiades star cluster.
• The Buzz, at the Toronto Public Library, shares a collection of books suitable for World Vegan Month, here.
• Henry Farrell at Crooked Timber considers, with an eye towards China and the Uighurs, how panopticon attempts can stray badly on account of–among other things–false assumptions.
• Gizmodo considers how antimatter could end up providing interesting information about the unseen universe.
• Joe. My. God. reports from New York City, where new HIV cases are dropping sharply on account of PrEP.
• JSTOR Daily shares a vintage early review of Darwin’s Origin of Species.
• Language Hat examines the origins of the semicolon, in Venice in 1494.
• Erik Loomis at Lawyers, Guns and Money shares a critical report of the new Jill Lepore book These Truths.
• The LRB Blog reports from the Museum of Corruption in Kyiv, devoted to the corruption of the ancient regime in Ukraine.
• Marginal Revolution shares a new history of the Lakota.
• The NYR Daily looks at the photography of Duane Michals.
• The Russian Demographics Blog looks at population trends in Russia, still below 1991 totals in current frontiers.
• Starts With A Bang’s Ethan Siegel explains why some of the lightest elements, like lithium, are so rare.
• Window on Eurasia shares the opinion of a Russian historian that Eastern Europe is back as a geopolitical zone.
• Arnold Zwicky considers Jacques Transue in the light of other pop culture figures and trends.

[NEWS] Five JSTOR Daily links: ch’arki, pisco, X-rays, lavender scare, language (@jstor_daily)

• JSTOR Daily examines ch’arki, an Andean food like jerky.
• JSTOR Daily reports on how Peru and Chile contest claims to being the origins of pisco.
• JSTOR Daily explores the X-ray craze of 1896, here.
• JSTOR Daily explores the “lavender scare” of the 1950s that saw dozens of queer men purged from the American government.
• JSTOR Daily looks at how linguists are using Urban Dictionary to study the evolution of language.

[BLOG] Some Friday links

(A day late, I know; I crashed after work yesterday.)

• Antipope’s Charlie Stross has a thought experiment: If you were superwealthy and guaranteed to live a long health life, how would you try to deal with the consequence of economic inequality?
• Vikas Charma at Architectuul takes a look at the different factors that go into height in buildings.
• Bad Astronomy notes S5-HVS1, a star flung out of the Milky Way Galaxy by Sagittarius A* at 1755 kilometres per second.
• The Broadside Blog’s Caitlin Kelly shares photos from two Manhattan walks of hers, taken in non-famous areas.
• Centauri Dreams looks at habitability for red dwarf exoplanets. Stellar activity matters.
• Maria Farrell at Crooked Timber shares words from a manifesto about data protection in the EU.
• Dangerous Minds shares photos from Los Angeles punks and mods and others in the 1980s.
• Bruce Dorminey notes a ESA report suggesting crew hibernation could make trips to Mars easier.
• Gizmodo notes that the Hayabusa2 probe of Japan is returning from asteroid Ryugu with a sample.
• Imageo shares photos of the disastrous fires in Australia from space.
• Information is Beautiful reports on winners of the Information is Beautiful Awards for 2019, for good infographics.
• JSTOR Daily explains how local television stations made the ironic viewing of bad movies a thing.
• Kotaku reports on the last days of Kawasaki Warehouse, an arcade in Japan patterned on the demolished Walled City of Kowloon.
• Language Hat notes how translation mistakes led to the star Beta Cygni gaining the Arabic name Albireo.
• Language Log reports on a unique Cantonese name of a restaurant in Hong Kong.
• Robert Farley at Lawyers, Guns and Money links to an analysis of his suggesting the military of India is increasingly hard-pressed to counterbalance China.
• The LRB Blog notes the catastrophe of Venice.
• Marginal Revolution notes a paper suggesting states would do well not to place their capitals too far away from major population centres.
• Justin Petrone at North! remarks on a set of old apple preserves.
• The NYR Daily looks at how the west and the east of the European Union are divided by different conceptions of national identity.
• Jim Belshaw at Personal Reflections reports from his town of Armidale as the smoke from the Australian wildfires surrounds all. The photos are shocking.
• Emily Lakdawalla at the Planetary Society Blog lists some books about space suitable for children.
• Drew Rowsome reviews the Canadian film music Stand!, inspired by the 1919 Winnipeg General Strike.
• The Russian Demographics Blog shares a paper noting that, in Switzerland, parenthood does not make people happy.
• The Signal notes that 1.7 million phone book pages have been scanned into the records of the Library of Congress.
• Starts With A Bang’s Ethan Siegel explains the concept of multi-messenger astronomy and why it points the way forward for studies of astrophysics.
• Strange Maps looks at how a majority of students in the United States attend diverse schools, and where.
• Strange Company explores the mysterious death of Marc-Antoine Calas, whose death triggered the persecution of Huguenots and resulted in the mobilization of Enlightenment figures like Voltaire against the state. What happened?
• Towleroad hosts a critical, perhaps disappointed, review of the major gay play The Inheritance.
• Understanding Society’s Daniel Little looks at the power of individual people in political hierarchies.
• Window on Eurasia shares an opinion piece noting how many threats to the Russian language have come from its association with unpopular actions by Russia.
• Arnold Zwicky explores queens as various as Elizabeth I and Adore Delano.

[URBAN NOTE] Fifteen Kitchener-Waterloo items (#waterlooregion)

• Work on the second stage of Ion expansion, south into Cambridge, will not even start until 2028, and is expected to cost at least $C 1.36 billion. Global News reports.
• This proposal for regular two-way GO Transit rail connections between Toronto and Kitchener-Waterloo, frankly, is desperately needed. The Record reports.
• A cyclist faces charges for careless driving leading to a collision with a LRT in Kitchener. CBC reports.
• A GoFundMe campaign for a woman hit by a train in Kitchener has raised more than $C14 thousand. The Record reports.
• A school bus driver has been charged for stopping his vehicle dangerously close to a rail crossing in Cambridge. The Record reports.
• Waterloo Region is a successful testbed for virtual doctor visits. The Record reports.
• The Charles Street bus terminal in downtown Kitchener is not going to be redeveloped for at least a couple of years. The Record reports.
• Waterloo Region hopes to create more than 600 affordable new homes, in five developments, over the next decade. CBC reports.
• The number of single food bank users in Kitchener-Waterloo has doubled over the past five years. CBC reports.
• Waterloo is spending $C 3 million to renovate and modernize a handsome old Carnegie Library. CBC reports.
• A pop-up in Kitchener, Vivid Dreams, is charging customers up to $C 20 to use one of a dozen backgrounds for their Instagram photos. CBC reports.</li
• A Kitchener woman, Heidi Bechtold, has a thriving new dog-related business, Complete K9. The Record reports.
• The new digital lab at the Kitchener Public Library sounds great! The Record reports.
• Andrew Coppolino at CBC Kitchener-Waterloo takes a look at some of the different cuisines and restaurants in Waterloo Region featuring noodles, here.
• Andrew Coppolino at CBC Kitchener-Waterloo looks at the pastel de nata, the Portuguese egg custard, as an emerging commercial snack in Waterloo Region.