A Few Things

Hello, Friends. Happy December! How are you? How was your Thanksgiving? And your Black Friday? How about your weekend? We’ve had such a full happy week since I last checked in with you. My sister Jordan and her husband Paul, and their three kids, trekked all the way to France for Thanksgiving and oh my goodness it was such a treat to be with family for the holiday.

We made a full Thanksgiving feast with a gorgeous table, we took the Ferneys to see the new house(!!!), we decorated our rental house for the holidays, we picked up a Christmas tree, we went to the holiday markets in Rouen, and we made a simple advent calendar too. (All of this was detailed on Instagram Stories, and you can find the expired stories in the Instagram highlights if you’re curious.)

I didn’t get a chance to publish my link list on Friday, but I saved so many good ones for you that I still want to post them. Here are a few things I’ve wanted to share with you:

-A growing number of public libraries are ditching late fees after finding that the penalties disproportionately deter the people who stand to benefit the most from free library resources — low-income residents and children.

-That uplifting post you just shared? A Russian Troll sent it. “Professional trolls are good at their job. They have studied us. They understand how to harness our biases (and hashtags) for their own purposes…”

-The philosophy of The Good Place is almost as wonderful as The Good Place itself. (Are you a fan of the show?)

-A measles outbreak in Samoa has left more than 50 people dead, most of them children. The government has banned children from public gatherings and mandated that all 200,000 people living on the South Pacific island get vaccinated.

-We have the tools and technology to work less and live better. We can produce more stuff with less labor. So why are we still working?

-“With guns off the menu in other countries, terrorists have to find alternative ways of killing people. The London Bridge attacker was armed with a kitchen knife.”

So into these gloves! They have cute details like triple buttons, and bows. They are touchscreen-friendly. They’re available in lots of colors. And they come in a 3-pack for $15.

-Half of the Trump administration’s latest trade-war bailout for farmers went to just a 10th of recipients in the program. “The farm rescue is now more than twice as expensive as the 2009 auto industry bailout, which ultimately cost taxpayers $12 billion.”

-UCLA scientists have discovered a link between a protein and the ability of human blood stem cells to self-renew.

Elon Musk is damaging the night sky. His satellites interfere with astronomers’ observations of stars and potentially harmful near-Earth asteroids, leaving streaks on images. No regulations require him to fix the problem. Soon it may be unfixable.

-Too many gifts? How many gifts do your kids get for Christmas or other winter holidays?

Imagine a world with no stray dogs.

And here are a few tweets I’ve saved for you:

What do you splurge on? It’s fun to read the responses.

-He put red dots on the founding fathers who owned slaves.

-Where do you go if you just want to be left alone? Interesting responses.

-A thread on the minimum wage.

https://twitter.com/gabriel_zucman/status/1200858083414536192

-Amazing to watch. I’m so grateful to the people who grow and harvest our food.

I hope you had a wonderful weekend. I missed you like crazy. I’m glad I get to connect with you today.

kisses,
Gabrielle

5 thoughts on “A Few Things”

  1. I really missed you too. I was worried that something bad had happened. So glad you we’re just too busy enjoying your family.

  2. Lots of great links! The radish-picking video is amazing and I lost quite a bit of time to the “it’s expensive but it’s worth it” thread….thanks!

  3. I pitted apricots for entire summer one year, only respect for all farm workers

    Great links as always…

    It’s interesting for me to read the comments below the tweet of the woman who is picking radishes. It tells me, more than anything, we all see what we want to see.

    While some of us see a woman “who has worked for a decade” on her knees bent over and constantly reaching as she pulls, earning whatever amount of money and feeling gratitude for the work we would never want to do; others of us are doing math and begging for us all to note that however hard her work is, she is making at least “$15-$20 and hour, or even “$70k per year!” so “what’s the big deal? She’s earning a lot more than minimum wage!” and or to “prove it!” (as in prove this is happening in America!) -because both of these ideas rationalize the idea of farm workers deserving a low wage or conditions or indeed “stealing jobs from legal citizens!”

    Some Americans still feel the need to have a good group of people below us, no matter how hard that group may work, no matter what challenges they endure – we *need* a sizable group of people below us so that we can feel just a tad superior. That feeling of false superiority is what helps us glamorize the unearned wealth and celebrity above us, after all, if someone is wealthier than we are – they *must* have worked harder, and those below us are unintelligent, lazy, and or somehow deserve their lot in life, right?

  4. Mom in High Heels

    Is this Strasbourg? We used to live 45 minutes to an hour from there (depending on traffic). When I was pregnant with our older son, I used to go there for lunch, because I craved the savory crepes at Crepe Mili.

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