monuments

Thoughty Thursday: Popping your mental corn, Sept 5-11, 2021

/ Melanie Marttila

It’s time, once again, to get your mental corn popping 🙂

Mariama Sojourner Eversley explains how the US Department of Justice can defund the police. The Forge

Chante Davis: Sunrise Movement’s Gulf Coast Trek highlights need for civilian climate corps. Teen Vogue

Mexico statue of Columbus to be replaced with one honoring Indigenous women. Associated Press

Meredith Deliso and Emily Shapiro report that Virginia removes 12-ton Robert E. Lee statue from Richmond’s monument avenue. NBC News

Sarah Roach explains how older workers are sidelined in tech. Protocol

Matthew Wills: what makes vaccine mandates legal? JSTOR Daily

Eleanor Beardsley: the Paris trial for the 2015 attacks began September 8, 2021. NPR

Trilateral path to university in Sudbury. CTV News

How much of you is alive? It’s okay to be smart

Brandon Specktor: strange, repeating radio signal near the center of the Milky Way has scientists stumped. Space.com

Matthew S. Williams explains why we should keep going to space instead of fixing Earth first. Interesting Engineering

World’s biggest machine capturing carbon from air (and mineralizing it and injecting it deep in the ground) turned on in Iceland. The Guardian

Jason Gregg: can birds help us avoid natural disasters? Hakai Magazine

Thank you for visiting, and I hope you took away something to inspire a future creative project.

Until next tipsday, be well and stay safe; be kind and stay strong. The world needs your stories!

Thoughty Thursday: Things that made me go hmmmm on the interwebz, July 11-17, 2021

/ Melanie Marttila

It’s time to get your mental corn popping! Let’s get right to it …

Ohimai Amaize unpacks the “social distance” between Africa and African Americans. JSTOR Daily

Charlottesville removes Robert E. Lee statue that sparked deadly rally. NPR

Thema Bryant-Davis and Egypt Leithman (of Pepperdine University) want to heal the wounds of racial trauma. Division 45

Allison Hopper: denial of evolution is a form of white supremacy. Scientific American

Louisiana teen, Zaila Avant-garde correctly spells “muraya” to win Scripp’s National Spelling Bee. ESPN

Zoé Samudzi is looking after (museums and human remains). Art Forum

Huu-ay-aht First Nation begin process of reclaiming cultural artefacts from Royal BC Museum. CBC

Coaches argue Laurentian’s pool must remain open: community impact will be “immense.” Sudbury.com

Could solar panels in space solve our energy needs? SciShow Space

Susan Montoya Bryan and Marcia Dunn report that billionaire Richard Branson reaches space in his own ship. Maybe reaches for space? Associated Press

Do we have more than five senses? Spoiler: hella yeah. SciShow Psych

Lauran Neergaard: device taps brainwaves to help paralyzed man communicate. Associated Press

Barrie, Ontario, devastated by tornado that left 5-kilometre path of destruction. CBC

Rescuers rush to save hundreds trapped by flooding in Europe as death toll tops 125. CBC

True facts: wild pigs (and their crazy cousins). ‘Cause fun and educational 🙂 Ze Frank

John Flesher reports that pup births a hopeful sign for Ilse Royale wolves. Associated Press

Thanks for taking the time to visit, and I hope you found something to inspire a future creative project.

Until next tipsday, be well and stay safe, be kind, and stay strong. The world needs your stories!

Thoughty Thursday: Things that made me go hmmmm on the interwebz, May 30-June 5, 2021

/ Melanie Marttila / 2 Comments

And now, it’s time to get your mental corn popping!

Zoe Watkins: George Floyd protests prompted a reckoning over colorism and Afro-Latinx identity. Teen Vogue

Solana Rice has a conversation with Tracey Corder about police abolition. The Forge

Jessica Wong explains how these three teachers bring anti-racist education into the elementary classroom. CBC

Debbie Elliott and Marisa Peñalosa: a century after the race massacre, Tulsa confronts its bloody past. NPR

Karlos K. Hill: photographing the Tulsa massacre of 1921. The Public Domain Review

Gary Younge explains why every single statue should come down. The Guardian

Leslie Nguyen-Okwu: to protect me from America, my parents changed my name without telling me. Harper’s Bazaar

How your gut bacteria control your mood. Dr. Tracey Marks

The Kamloops residential school’s mass gravesite: What we know about the 215 children’s remains, and Canada’s reaction so far. An explainer from The Globe and Mail.

The shocking way your body makes electricity. It’s okay to be smart

It’s like Christmas came early for cosmologists! Dr. Becky

Thanks for stopping by, and I hope that you took away something to inspire or inform a future creative project.

Until next tipsday, be well and stay safe, be kind, and stay strong. The world needs your stories!

Thoughty Thursday: Things that made me go hmmmm on the interwebz, May 9-15, 2021

/ Melanie Marttila / 1 Comment

‘Tis time, once again, to get your mental corn popping!

Tsione Wolde-Michael: we should think differently about racist monuments. Hyperallergic

Britni de la Cretaz reports that at least four transgender women of color were killed within ten days. Them

Mary Louise Kelly, Karen Zamora, and Amy Isackson want us to meet America’s newest chess master, 10-year-old Tanitoluwa Adewumi. NPR

Joal Stein: spatial abolition and disability justice. Public Books

Nidal Al-mughrabi and Jeffery Heller: Jerusalem violence leads to rockets, air strikes. Reuters

Why do we have bright ideas in the shower? SciShow Psych

Pete Evans: Greyhound Canada shutting down all bus service permanently. CBC

Perseverance’s robotic arm begins to conduct science. NASA

Adam Mann wonders, is Mars ours? The New Yorker

Joanna Partridge reports that electric cars will be cheaper to produce than fossil fuel vehicles by 2027. The Guardian

Patrick Whittle: Vineyard Wind project key to clean energy, is approved. Associated Press

Rebecca Mead reveals the mysterious origins of the Cerne Abbas Giant. The New Yorker

Oliver Milman reports that a forest the size of France regrown worldwide over 20 years. The Guardian

Thanks for visiting. I hope you found something to inspire a future creative project.

Until next tipsday, be well and stay safe, be kind, and stay strong. The world needs your stories!

Thoughty Thursday: Things that made me go hmmmm on the interwebz, March 28-April 3, 2021

/ Melanie Marttila

Thoughty Thursday is here. A little short on material that will get your mental corn popping this week. I’ve been cutting down on news for self-care purposes. Sorry. There’s still some excellent material here, though.

Susan Du and Nicole Norfleet: prayer service on eve of Derek Chauvin trial urges peace, unity, and justice. Star Tribune

Victoria Bekiempis announces that, for the first time, four women of colour command US navy warships. The Guardian

Matthew Barakat and Michael Kunzelman: high court rules that Charlottesville can remove confederate statues. Associated Press

Elissa Nadworny introduces us to the people cleaning a college campus during a pandemic: “without us, this campus shuts down.” NPR

Emma Graham-Harrison reports that Beijing cuts Hong Kong’s democratically elected seats in radical overhaul. The Guardian

Women/yn/xn, origins, labels, and the right to self-identify | Khadija Mbowe

Jacqueline Rose examines the damage silent forms of violence against women cause. The Guardian

Matthew Wills explains how women first learned self-defence. JSTOR Daily

Anton Troianovsky: hunting ghost particles beneath the world’s deepest lake. The New York Times

Amanda Kooser: dubbed “one who causes fear,” newly discovered dinosaur was a true, meat-eating terror. CNet

Elle Hunt reports that the rediscovery of a rare gecko delights experts. The Guardian

Kathryn Schulz explains why animals don’t get lost. The New Yorker

Lily Feinn tells the sweet tail (pun intended) of Sisu, the stray who kept trying to steal the same purple unicorn from a dollar store. The Dodo

Thank you for taking the time to visit. I hope you found something to inspire your next creative project.

Until next tipsday, be well and stay safe, be kind, and stay strong. The world needs your stories!

Thoughty Thursday: Things that made me go hmmmm on the interwebz, Jan 17-23, 2021

/ Melanie Marttila

It’s been another eventful week. Time to take stock and get your mental corn popping.

I’m not going to share anything about the inauguration itself. Everyone either watched it live or after the fact, I’m sure. The first 100 days is the proof in the pudding. I’m hopeful, but 2021’s rocky start enforces a certain caution. America has been collectively traumatized over the last four years and, as Chuck Wendig points out, healing takes time, and healing is painful.

Using your voice is a political choice | Amanda Gorman TED

Alexander Smith reports that the world watches as Biden leads a humbled US struggling to contain its crises. Day one gets off to a good start. NBC News

Maegen Vazquez: Trump administration releases racist school curriculum report on Martin Luther King Jr. Day. And then, on inauguration day, the 1776 report disappeared. CNN

Huw Jones and Estelle Shirbon report that London will remove statues linked to the slavery trade. Reuters

Ye Charlotte Ming: trapped in museums for centuries, Maori ancestors are coming home. Atlas Obscura

Marieke Walsh reports that as Pfizer covid-19 vaccine delays worsen, deliveries cut by 60%. And it’s not just Canada. The delays are affecting the US and some European countries, too. The Globe and Mail

Meanwhile, in Sudbury, where vaccines haven’t even been delivered yet, the health unit reports eight new confirmed cases of covid-19. On the large scale, it’s a drop in the bucket, but it just reflects that no where is safe, especially if people choose to travel and visit family in defiance of the stay-at-home order. Sudbury.com

Ashley Burke, who’s been following the story since the earliest allegations surfaced, gives us the scoop on the independent review into the claims of toxic workplace under Julie Payette. I am so disappointed that someone I respected could be capable of such abuse and mismanagement. CBC

Ian Austen: Canada’s Governor General resigns amid reports of a toxic workplace. The New York Times

Moonscapes. Dr. Noah Petro, Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter team, NASA Goddard

Astronomical records in trees. SciShow Space

Damian Carrington reveals that electric car batteries with five-minute charging times have been produced. The Guardian

Sneaky ways green chemistry is making our world safer. SciShow

Olga R. Rodriguez reports that the monarch butterfly population moves closer to extinction. Associated Press

There’s so much we got wrong about corals. SciShow

Natasha Daly shares joy over first White House shelter dog reflecting increasing embrace of rescue pets. National Geographic

Thanks for stopping by, and I hope you found something to inspire your next creative project.

Until next tipsday, be well and stay safe, be kind, and stay strong. The world needs your stories!

Thoughty Thursday: Things that made me go hmmmm on the interwebz, Dec 20-26, 2020

/ Melanie Marttila

It’s New Year’s Eve, the last thought Thursday, and the last curation of the year! This is your last opportunity to get your mental corn popping for 2020.

Chloe Alexander: body cam footage shows officer Jose Santos shooting Joshua Feast. It’s graphic. It’s distressing. This young man did not have to die. KENS5 News

Gregory S. Schneider reports that statue of General Robert E. Lee is removed from US Capitol. The Washington Post

Emmanuel Acho – How to have uncomfortable conversations with your loved ones.

Phoebie Shamiso Chigonde profiles nuclear scientist Senamile Masango. The Weight She Carries

15-year-old Jessica Hyatt, a Black woman chess champion, wins $40k scholarship. Season two of The Queen’s Gambit, anyone? Black News

Elly Belle: how white people can hold each other accountable to stop institutional racism. From last year, but we can’t lose sight of our responsibilities. Teen Vogue

Ryan Patrick Jones: Health Canada approves Moderna covid-19 vaccine. Between Pfizer and Moderna, we should have 1.2 million vaccinations available by Jan 31st. Good news for long-term-care homes, Indigenous populations in remote areas, and the rest of our valiant health care and other front-line workers! CBC 

Jamie Carter explains why 2020’s longest night of the year is special. Forbes

Mistletoe shouldn’t exist. SciShow

Danielle Prohom Olson considers the spirit of winter solstice: doe, a deer, a female deer. Gather Victoria

Dennis Zotigh shares Indigenous winter solstice traditions: a season of storytelling and ceremony. The Smithsonian Magazine

Ask an Elder: winter solstice in the Cree tradition. CBC

Piqsiq melds Inuit throat singing with classic Christmas tunes. CBC

Piqsiq – Coventry Carol

Researchers create entangled photons 100 times more efficiently than previously possible. The goal is to see quantum laptops in the backpack of every child. We’ll see. Phys.org

Chelsea Gohd reports that, following Arecibo’s collapse, China is opening the world’s largest radio telescope to international scientists. Space

Jonathan O’Callaghan and Lee Billings: alien hunters discover mysterious signal from Proxima Centauri. Scientific American

How Joan Feynman demystified auroras. SciShow Space

Hawaii’s Kilauea volcano erupts and earthquake rattles area. CBS News

Barnaby de Hoedt: hemp batteries are better than lithium and graphene. UK Cannabis Social Clubs

Thank you for visiting. I hope you found something to inspire your next creative project.

This weekend, I’ll be assembling my December next chapter update and year-end round up.

Until then, be well and stay safe, and have a happy New Year!

Thoughty Thursday: Things that made me go hmmmm on the interwebz, Oct 4-10, 2020

/ Melanie Marttila / 2 Comments

Welcome to thoughty Thursday, the curation that pops your mental corn 🙂

BLM-related posts and pandemic-related posts separated out for your convenience. Educating yourself is the least you can do.

Mako Fitts Ward examines the power of the intersectional protest image. JSTOR Daily

Jennifer Schuessler: Mellon Foundation to spend $250 million to reimagine monuments. The New York Times

Maya King hopes the Democrats don’t lose the battle over voter suppression. Politico

Kim Gallon: the Black press and disinformation on Facebook. JSTOR Daily

What is the QAnon conspiracy theory? CBS News

Janice Gassam Asare cites five reasons the “pipeline problem” is a myth. 2018. Again, these aren’t new issues. Forbes

John Paul Tasker reports on Annamie Paul’s historic election as the first Black [+Jewish+woman] leader of the Green Party [or any Canadian political party, for that matter]. CBC

Maan Alhmidi: teachers are concerned for their health and the quality of education as they deal with the challenges of the pandemic. The Globe and Mail

Kalyn Belsha says that teaching in-person and virtually at the same time is an instructional nightmare. ChalkBeat

How do pandemics end? BBC

Becky Little explains “mask slackers” and “deadly” spit: the 1918 flu campaigns to shame people into following the new rules. History

Sara Chodosh: it’s never been more important to get your flu shot. Popular Science

Lydia Wheeler: covid “long-haulers” ask who pays when sickness just won’t end. Bloomberg Law

Simi lists 30 signs of soul exhaustion. Medical News

What causes panic attacks and how can you prevent them? Cindy J. Aaronson TED-Ed

Nell GreenfieldBoyce and Madeline K. Sofia: the Nobels overwhelmingly go to white men—this year’s prize for medicine was no exception. NPR

Joel Achenbach reports that Andrea Ghez is among the winners of the Nobel Prize in physics for her work on black holes. The Washington Post

Dr. Becky delves into the work done to earn that Nobel.

Nell GreenfieldBoyce and Mark Katkov cover the Nobel Prize for Chemistry win for Emmanuelle Charpentier and Jennifer A. Doudna for their genome editing research. NPR

And … the 2020 Nobel Peace Prize goes to the World Food Program. Adela Suliman for NBC News.

Olivia Rosane shares a video of a meteoroid bouncing off Earth’s atmosphere. EcoWatch

Rory Sullivan and Sharon Braithwaite report that scientists have found intact brain cells in a man killed in Vesuvius eruption nearly 2,000 years ago. CNN

These 100-million-year-old microbes are still alive. (I think I shared an article on this a few weeks ago …) SciShow

Hedy Phillips: yep, just like humans, dogs can give blood. More than half my life ago, I worked in an emergency veterinarian clinic. They kept two blood donor cats on site and assessed surrendered or stray dogs (animal control was the next building over) for blood donor suitability. SugarPop

Thank you for visiting. I hope you found something to inspire your next creative project.

Until next tipsday, be well and stay safe, be kind, and stay strong. The world needs your stories!

Thoughty Thursday: Things that made me go hmmmm on the interwebz, Aug 16-22, 2020

/ Melanie Marttila

It’s time to get you mental corn popping.

Guy Kawasaki interviews Kathryn Finney for the Remarkable People podcast.

Emmanuel Acho and Matthew McConaughy. Uncomfortable conversations with a Black man

Luke Noronha examines life after deportation: no one tells you how lonely you’re going to be. The Guardian

Amy Thomas wonders, as statues are torn down, which monuments should we visit? National Geographic

Mohammed Elnaiem: on Black power in the Pacific. JSTOR Daily

Laura Pitcher: the history of the colour white and the women’s suffrage movement. Teen Vogue

Bonnie Berkowitz shares several things you didn’t know (or forgot) about how women got the vote. The Washington Post

Jewel Wicker lists the 16 best quotes about women of colour deserving the right to vote. Teen Vogue

Locally, Nancy Johnson writes a letter to the editor: are we doing enough to control the pandemic? The Sudbury Star

Olga Khazan: America’s terrible internet is making quarantine worse. Why millions of students still can’t get online. The Atlantic

Emma K. Atwood and Sarah Williamson: plague and protest go hand in hand. JSTOR Daily

Elizabeth Yuko explains how to embrace uncertainty, even if you’re nervous. Life Hacker

Billie Eilish – My Future. Not what I was expecting. In the best way 🙂

Richard Hollingham: the pioneering surgeons who cleaned up filthy hospitals. BBC

Meilan Solly invites you to peer into the past with photorealistic portraits of Roman emperors. The Smithsonian Magazine

Karen Gardiner considers Denmark’s 300-year-old homes of the future. BBC

Maggie Hiufu Wong: Japan’s first-ever hotel in a wooden castle breathes new life into a fading rural town. CNN

Jonathan Smith introduces us to Patrick Cashin, who captured the secrets of the New York City subway. Huck

SciShow Space news explains what happened to Betelgeuse and reports an accident at Arecibo.

Laura Poppick explains how the origin of mud is linked to the origin of life. Knowable

Tori B. Powell: taking care of plants is a lesson in empathy. Shondaland

Thank you for visiting. I hope you found something to inspire your next creative project.

Until next tipsday, be well and stay safe, be kind, and stay strong. The world needs your stories!

ThoughtyThursday2019

Thoughty Thursday: Things that made me go hmmmm on the interwebz, July 12-18, 2020

/ Melanie Marttila

Happy Friday eve! Without further delay, it’s time to get your mental corn popping 🙂

An example of how white supremacy privileges things over humans. Black Lives Matter Toronto holds a press conference after three protestors are arrested for “defacing” statues. Don’t even look at the comments on this one if you’re not prepared to be triggered. CTV

Mary Hynes interviews Ijeoma Oluo on Tapestry. CBC

Ashawnta Jackson explains what the first Black-owned bookstore had to do with the underground railroad. JSTOR Daily

Sarah Gilbert: civil rights activist and politician, John Lewis—a life in pictures. The Guardian

Sonia Saraiya interviews Viola Davis: my entire life has been a protest. Vanity Fair

Paul McGuinness reveals the power of protest songs. uDiscover Music

Amy Greer, Nisha Thampi and Ashleigh Tuite: we can get children back to school full time, if we put the right strategy in place. The problem is, no one can agree on what that strategy is … The Globe and Mail

North Bay OPP charge Florida couple with failing to self-isolate. CBC

What happened when we all stopped, narrated by Jane Goodall. TED.Ed

Adam Mann: the universe’s clock might have bigger ticks than we imagine. Scientific American

Mary Robinette Kowal does a dramatic reading of her “peeing in space” Twitter thread for Uncanny Magazine. It is hilarious.

David Szondy: 75 years ago, the Trinity atomic bomb test changed the world forever. New Atlas

Mark Wilson says knock codes were supposed to be more secure than passwords or PINs, but they’re surprisingly easy to hack. Fast Company

Catie Keck shares everything we know about the 2020 Twitter hack (so far). Gizmodo

Nathanael Johnson: the population bomb didn’t detonate, but it turns out there’s a new problem. Grist

Feargus O’Sullivan goes behind the accidentally resilient design of Athens apartments. CityLab

Sophia Smith Galer reveals the accidental invention of the Illuminati conspiracy. BBC

SciShow busts the “alpha dog” theory.

Jimmy Thomson says, one solution to the world’s climate woes is Canada’s natural landscapes. The Narwhal

Alexandra Witze: how humans are altering the tides of the oceans. BBC

Thank you for stopping by. I hope you took away something to inspire a future creative project.

Until next tipsday, be well and stay safe, by kind, and stay strong. The world needs your stories!

ThoughtyThursday2019