Well, deadly if you are a checkerspot butterfly, anyway. There are birds and various other critters that will be eager to gobble you up, including crab spiders. Something about this webby dried up weed must have attracted the attention of the checkerspot... its last mistake, alas.
... according to Our World in Data. Mosquitoes come in first, and humans second. Snakes are a distant third, followed by dogs. All of that is plausible to me. These guys do good work, and I trust their research, but I was surprised that neither fleas nor the rodents that carry them made the list. Surely the plague, tamed though it may be, still carries off more humans than the sharks that account for only six fatalities per year. And ticks? Nada?
(Image: Wikipedia)
Pnin
Vladimir Nabokov
On one level, this is an academic satire, and a very good one indeed. Pnin, a rather ridiculous absent-minded professor, comes in for mostly gentle mocking. The set pieces and depictions of academia are at times laugh-out-loud funny. But soon enough we discern an undercurrent of deep melancholy and even tragedy, and various indications that the omniscient narrator may not be completely reliable. Who is this narrator? And who is this Pnin? Fool, or modest hero? And the prose: Many sentences and passages will make you catch your breath. As close to perfect as a little novel can be.
The Surgeon's Mate
Patrick O'Brian
This one finds intrepid Aubrey and Maturin on a clever and successful mission in the Baltic Sea, later shipwrecked in Brittany and imprisoned in Paris, with an escape and wedding to close out the yarn. Maybe too much plot?... but never too much Aubrey, Maturin, or seafaring adventure.
David Cole on the Maduro operation in historical perspective:
But in other respects Trump’s “brilliant operation” is unprecedented in modern US history. These earlier strikes were in response to actual or threatened attacks on the US. By contrast, Trump’s unilateral actions against Venezuela were entirely unprovoked. The implication of the administration’s reasoning is that countries can use military force anytime they are unhappy with how another country regulates or fails to regulate conduct within its borders that could have injurious effects elsewhere. But this is ludicrous. By the administration’s logic, Canada could start shooting Americans suspected of carrying drugs over the US–Canada border, or bomb buildings in the US that it claimed were being used to manufacture the drugs. Mexico could do the same with respect to American manufacturers of guns that are routinely used in gang violence, which kills many thousands of Mexicans each year.
Perhaps we should be relieved if it really is just about taking their oil. Or perhaps not...
I like to cook marinara sauce. It's pretty easy, you can control the seasoning, and if you use high-quality canned tomatoes it's almost always better than what you could buy in a jar. Well, so I used to think, until I discovered this stuff. Very simple, very bright-tasting and tomato-y, well seasoned but letting the tomatoes shine, not too sweet, not chunky, but not pureed either. You can augment with more veggies, mushrooms, or meat. You can also add it to a simple soup made from leftovers. During tomato season, I plan to continue buying bargain "sort-outs" from the farmers' market and making sauce from scratch. Off season... this stuff.
