“A reader lives a thousand lives before he dies, said Jojen. The man who never reads lives only one.”
Yes, Reading Has Changed. Adapt.
This website has an endless collection of less-famous Robert Doisneau shots to click through.
If you can’t hold it, you don’t own it
The Guardian – If you can’t hold it, you don’t own it’: why media fans want to escape algorithms with CDs, DVDs and vinyl. People describe their return to physical media – whether to protect data, support artists, or retain control of one’s choices. ‘If you can’t hold it, you don’t own it’: why media fans want to escape algorithms with CDs, DVDs and vinyl…”
Three Intersections of Taxpayer Privacy and the IRS
In a system predicated on voluntary compliance, taxpayer privacy is an evergreen concern. But in recent weeks, three disparate events have raised questions about the security of taxpayer data—and what information the government should collect through the tax system.
What are these events? First, the Treasury Inspector General for Tax Administration’s report on IRS employees’ access to celebrity taxpayers’ return information. Second, allegations that IRS officials leaked an employee’s tax information to the Department of Justice in retaliation for whistleblowing. Third, the controversial inclusion of a citizenship or work authorization question on Form 1040, that hallowed pillar of individual filing and frequent political football.
Details and connections, below the fold.
Things That Are Good to Do
QuarterMile: “I used to struggle with life. I still do sometimes. But things have gotten a lot better since I started writing things down. Things that, if I do them, make life a little nicer to live. And now it’s really easy. I just have to remember all of these things, all of the time.
And I have to do them. Always. Easy! You can live the life of your dreams too. If, like me, you only remember and follow this list. Bonus fact: if you read the below list then you are also exempt from ever having to read a self-help book again. Just a few from an excellent, long list:’
- Admit what you don’t know.
- Buy less.
- Drink water first.
- Reply when people message you.
- Learn everyone’s story.
- Ask for directions.
- Read the ingredients.
- Take the scenic route.
- Finish the book. Or don’t, if it’s bad.
- Keep your kitchen clean.
- Close the cabinet.
- Sharpen your knives.
- Own a flashlight.
- Carry a reusable bag.
- Water the plants.
- Wear clothes that fit.
- Learn CPR.
- Know your blood type.
- Stretch before lifting.
- Keep in touch.
- Bring something to share.
- Close the gate.
- Lock the bike.
- Carry an umbrella.
- Expect traffic.
- Wear a helmet.
- Read the map.
- Know north.
- Borrow books.
- Read the instructions.
- Check twice.
- Measure twice.
- Cut once.
- Make fewer assumptions.
- Rest before you’re exhausted.
- Keep your weekends meaningful.
- Put your keys in the same place.
- Keep a spare key.
- Label the box.
- Organize once.
- Declutter often.
- Look out the window.
- Watch the birds.
- Notice the weather.
- Appreciate ordinary beauty.
- Keep fresh flowers.
- Open the blinds.
- Let sunlight in.
- Keep fresh air flowing.
- Sharpen your pencil.
- Write by hand.
- Date your notes.
Wenzel Hablik (1881) was a painter, graphic artist, architect, designer, and craftsman from Bohemia of the early twentieth century, associated with German Expressionism. At the age of six, he found a specimen of crystal, and saw in it “magical castles and mountains” that would later appear in his art. Hablik died at Itzehoe in 1934. The Wenzel Hablik Museum was established in the city of Itzehoe in 1995. The museum contains much of his art, as well as his collections of crystals and minerals, seashells and snails.
More of his work, found on Tumblr.
Duchess of Swabia, Agnes of Waiblingen (1072–1143), was the daughter of Holy Roman Emperor Henry IV, and lived to be about 70 years old. She married twice, had 17 children and became the mother of German kings and Holy Roman emperors. While medieval women rarely ruled in their own right, Agnes’s personal achievement was the deliberate cultivation of an extraordinary network of children and she positioned them meticulously across the geopolitical chessboard of Europe. Agnes was far from a passive political figure. Upon the sudden death of her second husband, Margrave Leopold III of Austria, in 1136, she actively secured the political succession of Austria. She was a prolific patron of the church, co-founding major institutions that remain culturally significant today.
That’s about all the juice you can dig up on her, so this absolutely feels like a research project crying out for a historian.
