Events

Actually, Christmas Island crabs, which migrate around Christmas, and were the subject of an NPR story yesterday: Palm fronds, turquoise lagoons and a clattering army of crustaceans making their way from the island's forest to the beaches. Christmas Island red crabs - 50 million of them. Jahna Luke works for Christmas Island's tourism association and lives there. She says everyone has a hand in the crabs' journey. JAHNA LUKE: We have all these measures in place to keep the crabs safe while they make...

Armed with an InstantPot, a Cuisinart, and some basic understanding of cooking, I made this today: Starting here: Ingredients used (amounts where known): Hot Italian sausage, 300 g Salt Mild Italian sausage, 150 g Pepper Diced pancetta, 50 g Butter Tomato puree, 800 mL Juice of 1 lemon Tomato paste Juice of 1 lime Olive oil Basil Mirepoix (onion, carrot, celery) Sage Shallot Rosemary Garlic Thyme Romano Smoked chile powder Parmesan Chipotle powder Red pepper flakes Mushrooms Coriander Bay leaves I...

A year ago today, I got this lovely plug-in hybrid: Because she (her name is Hana, or 初夏) has an on-board computer (well, probably a couple dozen, to be honest), I know exactly how well she did: Total distance 6,969.4 km Total fuel consumed 186.7 L Fuel economy 2.7 L/100 km Farthest north 43.68°N Farthest south 41.32°N Farthest east 79.37°W Farthest west 87.96°W Sad to see she never made it all the way to the 88th meridian, given that I live only about 21 minutes east of it. But she did make it to five...

OK, guys, chill. On Wednesday, researcher Maya Forstater lost an employment arbitration case in London after being fired for expressing the belief that "it is impossible to change sex." (Andrew Sullivan believes the same thing, but as a Tory and a cis-gendered gay man apparently when he says it no one freaks out.) Author JK Rowling Tweeted out a narrow bit of support for Forstater: Dress however you please.Call yourself whatever you like.Sleep with any consenting adult who’ll have you. Live your best...

If the forecasts remain accurate, Christmas in Chicago will round out only the fifth "holiday temperature reversal" in history: This could be only the 5th time that Christmas will be warmer than BOTH Halloween and Thanksgiving since records began in Chicago back in 1871.   Halloween Thanksgiving Christmas 1873 -1°C 1°C 3°C 1895 6°C 5°C 13°C 1954 4°C 6°C 7°C 1982 7°C 3°C 9°C 2019 1°C 3°C 7°C I'd say "cool" but that's cheap.

Former Deadspin editor David Roth examines the evidence in this year's White House Christmas decorations video: Even though Melania is also a cipher whose relationship to her powerful husband has for years seemed tragicomically ceremonial, her Christmas video delivers an insight into a crucial mystery of the Trump aesthetic: Why is all this always so shitty? How is it possible for something so fancified to feel so repellent and cheap? Again, in one sense, there’s just nothing there to find. Trump...

(Say it with me: "Under where?") Australia just hit a record temperature—for the whole country: The Australian Bureau of Meteorology (BOM) reports preliminary data showing that for Dec. 18, the nationally averaged maximum temperature was 41.9°C. This beat the old record of 40.9°C, which had been set the day before. Before this heat event, the country’s hottest day was Jan. 7, 2013, which had an average high temperature of 40.3°C. Human-caused global climate change is making heat waves such as this one...

Yesterday, the House of Representatives impeached the president for abuse of power and obstruction of Congress: After 11 hours of fierce argument on the House floor between Democrats and Republicans over Trump’s conduct with Ukraine, lawmakers voted almost entirely along party lines to impeach him. Trump becomes the third president in U.S. history to face trial in the Senate — a proceeding that will determine whether he is removed from office less than one year before he stands for reelection. The...

With only two weeks left in the decade, it looks like the 2010s will end...bizarrely. More people have taken a look at the President's unhinged temper tantrum yesterday. I already mentioned that Aaron Blake annotated it. The Times fact-checked it. And Jennifer Rubin says "It is difficult to capture how bizarre and frightening the letter is simply by counting the utter falsehoods...or by quoting from the invective dripping from his pen." As for the impeachment itself, Josh Marshall keeps things simple...

The President of the United States threw another tantrum today, this time in the form of a six-page letter to Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi (D-CA). It isn't exactly the Gettysburg Address: President Trump on Tuesday denounced what he called a “partisan impeachment crusade” being waged against him by Democrats, calling the effort to remove him an unconstitutional abuse of power and an “attempted coup” that would come back to haunt them at the ballot box next year. “I have no doubt the American people...