- FDA has given two biotechnology companies approval for clinical trials that will transplant organs from genetically modified pigs into patients with kidney failure.
- That “fresh” apple you just grabbed at the grocery store was probably picked a thousand miles away and over a year ago. The latest episode of Radiolab, Forever Fresh, was full of surprising facts about the food industry. (Spoiler: It’s all about plastics.)
Here are two fascinating links on the importance and function of sleep: Our Sleep, Brain Aging, and Waste Clearance and Scientists Uncover How the Brain Washes Itself During Sleep – both via Jodi Ettenberg- I’m considering adding my bluesky feed to a (new) sidebar on this site using Robert Devore’s WordPress Plugin.
- How do MAGA voters feel after the first two weeks of idiotic executive orders, flagrant disregard for the Constitution, economic upheaval, and diplomatic absurdities? They’re mostly fine with it, which is as horrible and disturbing as it is unsurprising. It was never about eggs.
- Five VSCode Extensions to Supercharge Your Markdown Writing has me interested in looking into VSCode again. (I’ve been using Nova (née Coda) from Panic forever, but really hate the way it handles remote servers and connections.)
- Rather than understand – or even acknowledge – the paradox of intolerance, the increasingly-popular newsletter / publishing platform Substack has decided to double-down on it.
- “Dr. Potter will not be silenced by UnitedHealthcare‘s attempts to threaten and harass her.” Pop Quiz: Without knowing any of the details about this legal issue, would you root for the health insurance company or the doctor?
- A second grade teacher in Philadelphia is using football to help her students score big in math. Her students take inspiration from their hometown football team — the Eagles — practicing their math skills by counting rushing statistics held by Eagles running back Saquon Barkley. – via George Conway
Posts tagged “plugins”
- I loved reading this story about an 11-yo who pulled one of the most valuable baseball cards in history. The best quote from the article? “My brain pooped.”
- Hackers are hijacking WordPress sites to push malware on unsuspecting visitors. This is another good reason to make sure your plugins are core files are routinely updated.
- This short article about the psychology of scene transitions in film is really interesting. (Watch the video, too!)
One of the more concerning consequences of the current administration is that when the most powerful nation in history is ruled by feckless ignorant toads, those who lust for power elsewhere are emboldened:
- Paramilitary group attacks an open market in Sudan, killing 54 people and wounding scores
- Congo says 773 dead in week-long fighting as military tries to repel Rwanda-backed rebels
- Last night I realized I can watch Dinosaurs: The Final Day with David Attenborough on BBC through AppleTV. I had to pay for it, but I think that’s pretty reasonable. I was pleasantly surprised to see Steve Brusatte make an appearance. I read his book, The Rise and Fall of the Dinosaurs: A New History of a Lost World a year or two ago and loved it. It’s really mind-blowing how much more we know about dinosaurs than we did when I was fascinated with them in elementary school. Scientists might even have finally discovered where dinosaurs first evolved! (The documentary is titled Dinosaur Apocalypse on AppleTV for some reason. I guess that sounds much more dramatic.)
- More Bird Flu Bad News: Infectious disease expert warns wind-blown avian feces may be route of transmission.
- Google searches for “adult tennis lessons” were up 245 percent shortly after the premiere of the Zendaya love-triangle sports-flick Challengers. – via The Athletic
- After reading a few of her Bluesky posts, I decided to subscribe to the tech newsletter rendezvous with cassidoo.
- Just in case you were under the misguided impression that the current administration cares about, y’know, people:
- The head of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau has been fired.
- On Monday the Senate confirmed fossil fuel executive Chris Wright to serve as Secretary of Energy.
- A Coup in Plain Sight: An Explainer as the Crisis Solidifies
WordPress Wednesday: @UpdraftPlus
The most important WordPress plugin
WordPress Wednesday: Huge Archives
In which I explain how to beautifully display enormous WordPress archives in a compact format
WordPress Wednesday: Safe Function Calls
If you’re editing a WordPress theme template file by adding a call to a plugin’s function, you need to be careful. In six months or a year you’re going to deactivate or delete that plugin, and you’re going to get a big ugly fatal PHP error on your blog. You can avoid it, though, by
WordPress Wednesday: Admin Lists
Right now I’ve got just under 3,400 posts here on this site. That makes it sort of a pain when I’m browsing through them in the back-end because by default the WordPress engine is set to display lists of posts fifteen at a time. I frequently have twenty or more drafts and / or scheduled
WordPress Wednesday: Pithy Quotes Plugin
If you look at the top of this page you’ll see that there is a short quip displayed in my header. Every time you visit any page, it changes. I have about fifteen little quotes in my database and they’re set to display randomly with each refresh of the page. I wrote a plugin which
- General Stuff
- Crush the Castle is an awesome Flash game. You will become addicted. (Luckily you’ll also quickly finish the whole game, so it’s not that bad.)
- The vendor/client relationship is often quite funny.
- I need to get about two dozen of these kick-ass CableDrops. (Or you could buy me some for my birthday!)
- The black Crocs Santa Cruz loafer is quite possibly the most comfortable shoe I’ve ever owned. I bought a pair in Maui to wear on the beach, but I’ve been wearing them to work lately because they’re so great. I like them so much I might just buy another pair in a different color.
- I’m GatorDavid on the World Golf Tour if anyone wants to challenge me. That game is like crack.
- Sure, sure… explosionsandboobs.com is a lot of fun. But have you seen explosionsandbobs.com?
- Anything is possible at zombo.com!
- Techie Stuff
2025-02-19: Broken links in this post have been removed and/or updated.
WordPress Wednesday: Amazon QuickTags Plugin
In which I add some buttons to the Wordpress Admin content editor
WordPress Wednesday: How to Display the Age of Your Site
If you scroll to the bottom of this page, you’ll see that in my footer I display how long I’ve been publishing this site. It’s pretty simple to do this; all you really need is the DateDiff plugin and PHP’s default date() function.