Afternoon Tea (3/6/19)

‘This Land Is Meant Only for Saffron. Without It, It Means Nothing.’

An interesting piece about Texas archaeology: On the Range

The Fan-Fiction Friendship That Fueled a Romance-Novel Empire

Quantum Physics Could Protect the Grid From Hackers—Maybe

Gradients: the colorful design trend aiming to soothe these anxious times

Afternoon Tea (12/17/18)

I knew some of this, but seeing it all laid out is quite something: Is the Women’s March Melting Down?

Chris Watts Killed His Family. Then The Love Letters Started Rolling In.

Good background for the Nicole Cliffe thing: A Penthouse Divided

The Year Star Wars Fans Finally Ruined Star Wars

This book sounds really interesting: Is Empowerment Just a Marketing Strategy?

Afternoon Tea (12/10/18)

This is fascinating: Black Lives and the Boston Massacre

Some Words Defy Translation. Angela Merkel Showed Why.

Ariana Grande and Priyanka Chopra don't need fans who send death threats. Fan culture needs a reboot.

Ooh, these all sound interesting: TBRainbow Alert: Heists, Thrillers, and Mysteries

The Playlist: Non-Christmas Music For The Holidays

Afternoon Tea (10/2/18)

Millennials can’t stop writing fanfiction about coffee shops

The rise, fall, and unlikely return of Murphy Brown, explained

Inside Barstool Sports’ Culture of Online Hate: ‘They Treat Sexual Harassment and Cyberbullying as a Game’

Here's the Medieval manuscripts blog's calendar page for the month.

Baby's First Mystery Fiction

Morning Coffee (7/2/18)

Me elsewhere: TV news for the week.

López Obrador, an Atypical Leftist, Wins Mexico Presidency in Landslide

What Justice Kennedy's Retirement Means for the Future of LGBTQ+ Rights

The White House Is Becoming A Ghost Town. Trump Loyalists Worry It's Going To Get Worse.

In America, Naturalized Citizens No Longer Have an Assumption of Permanence

Of course: White House wants to cut this public health service corps by nearly 40 percent

I feel like I've been dreading this headline for years: Japanese Blogger Is Killed After Giving Lecture on Online Trolls

Newly Discovered ‘Limb Pit’ Reveals Civil War Surgeons’ Bitter Choices

SIGH: Goop Is Categorizing Its Wellness Stories from “Rigorously Tested” to “For Your Enjoyment”

TanaCon: How a convention thrown in retaliation led to mass chaos, cancellation (Running a convention is NOT FOR AMATEURS, you guys.)

Chipotle Keeps Stealing From Taco Bell’s Playbook

Afternoon Tea (5/23/18)

The Huge Impact of Donated Bras

Balance the books: one woman's fight to keep great female writers on shelves

This on skater Yuzuru Hanyu's fans is very interesting: The crush of the crowd

Harry Potter, the Arthurian Romance

Little House on the Prairie and Cheesemaking in America’s Dairyland

Morning Coffee (4/28/18)

Hmm: North and South Korea Set Bold Goals: A Final Peace and No Nuclear Arms

All 4 service chiefs on record: No harm to units from transgender service

Bill Cosby Found Guilty Of All Charges In Sexual Assault Retrial

Charlie Rose Is Getting A New Show Because We Don't Care About The Women He Hurt

This is good in THIS case but... not great as precedent in general: Relative's DNA from genealogy websites cracked East Area Rapist case, DA's office says

This case is so terrible in so many ways: Hart Family, Before Driving Off Cliff, Hid Dark Home Life From View

Conventions are NOT AN EASY THING TO PULL OFF and I don't know why people keep thinking they are: Universal Fan Con: Peeling Back the Layers

I hate him so much! Bernie Sanders Is Quietly Building a Digital Media Empire

Swedish archaeologists uncover brutal 5th century massacre

Guys. Yankees Spell Didi Gregorius' Name Wrong While Promoting Bat Day Giveaway

Morning Coffee (4/11/18)

Me elsewhere: Holly and I have a new podcast episode on Breaking Up with Fandom!

Donald Trump is very confused about attorney-client privilege

Good! With $2 million, Kaiser Permanente wants to help revive underfunded gun-violence research

New Memo Shows How Republicans Used Tax Bill to Enrich Themselves

This is awful: Thousands of Indian Women Find Their American Dreams in Jeopardy

Ha: Scottish police ‘rescue’ metal fans mistaken for suicide pact members

The Pay Gap Is Way Too Entrenched To Be Solved By Women Alone

But good for them: HBO Fixes All Pay Disparities In Direct Response To Time’s Up Movement

The New Military-Industrial Complex of Big Data Psy-Ops

Furrowed Eyebrows Helped Modern Humans Evolve

Vitamins for your hair, nails, and skin are everywhere on Instagram. Don’t fall for them.

Afternoon Tea (3/8/18)

The unwelcome revival of ‘race science’

‘Black Panther’ Is Groundbreaking, But It’s Shuri Who Could Change The World

Acrimony F.C.: M.L.S. Teams and Fan Groups Navigate a Rocky Marriage

"Boy" books vs. "Girl" books: How do we stop the labeling?

Mining Liberty: Daniel Roberdeau’s Quest for Lead on the Pennsylvania Frontier

Morning Coffee (10/11/17)

The Kurds of County Leitrim: Refugees Call an Irish Town Home

The Intrepid Teachers Bringing Internet Access To Women In Rural India

Nearly Half Of All Abortions Unsafe In Developing Countries

He's exactly as terrible as you think he is, but this is still worth a read: Stephen Miller, the Powerful Survivor on the President’s Right Flank

Awww, this story: A survivalist filled his massive basement with food — then decided Puerto Ricans needed it more

An important project: Mapping Hate

Sigh: Guess Whether These Headlines Came From Breitbart or 1920s KKK Newspapers

Of... of course: My Immortal memoir canceled: Author says she's been 'branded a liar'

Belgian ‘Indiana Jones’ Tries to Solve Mystery of a WWI Submarine

A 1775 Map Reveals the Extent of Human Impact on Florida’s Coral Reefs

Afternoon Tea (9/25/17)

(You've got a few more days to join me on Patreon and get September rewards!)

Author Alisha Rai Discusses Writing Romance Novels in a Very Rough Year

The Paranoid Girls of Tumblr

The Making of the Modern American Recipe

The Other Invasion (by which they mean the 1167 Anglo-Norman invasion of Ireland)

This headline is hilarious, but the piece is interesting! Why It Matters Where Your Jewels Come From

Morning Coffee (9/15/17)

As usual, we're going to put current events mostly on hold and find some happy links to celebrate Friday!

Me elsewhere: Holly and I recorded an episode of The Fourth Wall about Fall TV and the Emmys. Come listen to us have opinions on TV we haven't seen!

Oooh, here's the National Book Award Nonfiction longlist. Some interesting stuff on there I want to read!

This was a complete delight and I don't even particularly care about Harrison Ford: Harrison Ford on Star Wars, Blade Runner, and Punching Ryan Gosling in the Face

LOOK AT PBTEEN'S NEW HARRY POTTER COLLECTION. I guess I don't ACTUALLY want a themed bedroom, but it's tempting.

Oh, I love this list every year! Top 5 Baby Names By State For Births In 2016

Amazing: Danielle Steel’s Desk Is Unlike Anything You’ve Ever Seen

Cool! Uno is finally getting a colorblind-friendly edition

Here’s the World’s Best Honey Cake, According to Science

Beauty and the Beast Le Creuset is totally the kind of thing I would buy if I had lots of extra money lying around.

!! 16 Gifts Every Cheese Lover Will Obsess Over

Afternoon Tea (9/8/17)

Happy weekend! Don't forget to check out my new Patreon rewards and join if you enjoy these posts!

This profile is very interesting and well done and POOR KID: Dylan O’Brien Is Ready to Talk About That Accident

This is great and JUST LIKE THEM, I promise: Sarah Rees Brennan and Maureen Johnson chat about writing and murder

I'm still not 100% sure I believe this, honestly: The Story Of "My Immortal" Is More Wild And Heartbreaking Than You Imagined

How to Write While the World Burns

That's enough, clowns.

Afternoon Tea (7/27/17)

This look at a true crime convention is fascinating: DNA or It Didn’t Happen

Back from the Front: Tracking down WW1 grave markers

The 19th-Century Lithuanians Who Smuggled Books to Save Their Language

The Lady Anatomist Who Brought Dead Bodies to Light

The Fiercely Precise World of Competitive Table-Setting

Morning Coffee (5/29/17)

Me elsewhere: TV news for the week!

Uh... The Trump Organization Says It's 'Not Practical' to Comply With the Emoluments Clause

Trump's Proposed Budget Would Cut $2.2 Billion From Global Health Spending

The many ways Trump has tried to intervene in the Russia investigation, in one chart

Ivanka doesn’t moderate Trump; she sells him to moderates

Interesting: Asian Kenyans Seek to Be Declared a ‘Tribe’ of Their Own

!! D-day veteran becomes world's oldest skydiver at 101 and 38 days

Ha! JFK wrote a letter to his mom politely asking her to not contact heads of state without asking first

Ooh: 9 World War II Novels Coming Out This Summer

Every word of this headline fills me with horror: YouTube Stars, Wattpad Stories Tapped for Fullscreen’s Fan-Fiction Anthology Series

Afternoon Tea (5/9/17)

How African-Americans Disappeared From the Kentucky Derby

This is great: We Accidentally Spent a Wild Evening with the World's Biggest Fifty Shades of Grey Fans

A Culinary Renaissance in the Israeli Countryside

A Refuge for Liberal Values Beneath a Stern Victorian Gaze

The Queen's Encomium

Morning Coffee (1/20/17)

Well, here we are. I continue resolutely with your normal Happy Friday links today, in case you need them. Don't worry, I'll have plenty of awful stuff for you tomorrow.

President Obama's thank you note to the people is just lovely, and there's a place at the bottom to sign up for his future updates.

My friend Jordan Edwards made awesome fandom protest signs if you're headed out tomorrow (or whenever).

This reading list will keep you distracted for a while: Every book Barack Obama has recommended during his presidency

Awwwwww: The Obamas Visited Malia and Sasha’s Old Swing Set at Its New Home at a D.C. Shelter

!!!! Lisa Frank Live-Action, Animation Hybrid Movie in Development

We could probably all use a cocktail tonight: 10 Cold Weather Cocktails Guaranteed to Warm Up Your Winter

Introducing Daliyah, the 4-year-old girl who has read more than 1,000 books

I'm so happy the Fug Girls are recapping Victoria (which I quite like so far).

This is sweet: The Queen to take in gamekeeper’s dogs after his death

I want to go there! There's now a Harry Potter-themed pasta restaurant in Brooklyn

Charming Portraits of Hong Kong’s Shop Cats

Whoa: 2Cellos Conquer King’s Landing With Epic ‘Game Of Thrones’ Theme Rendition

Morning Coffee (10/18/16)

There Is a Conspiracy to Rig the Election, and Donald Trump Is Part of It

How Trump Took Hate Groups Mainstream

“Trump Manages To Channel Goebbels”: White Nationalists Cheer Nominee’s Conspiratorial Speech Packed With Anti-Semitic Themes

"Like the female protagonist of a quest narrative—or, perhaps, of a dystopian fantasy—Clinton has made it through all her challenges to face the bull-headed Minotaur of sexism at the end of the maze."

The Time a Trump Aide Sued a Trump Adviser Over an Anti-Hillary Group Called C.U.N.T.

I shouldn't laugh but I can't help it: Kaakutja, Perhaps the First Known Boomerang Victim

This is a lovely profile of editor Robert Gottlieb.

Should TV pilots end with twists?

Fascinating: Stars Getting Rich Off Fan Conventions: How to Take Home "Garbage Bags Full of $20s" (I am not as outraged by this as it seems the article wants me to be.)

The Politics of Pockets

Morning Coffee (8/21/16)

All our dreams have been answered: We've got a potential first spouse cookie battle! Should I try both recipes and report back?

It’s time to accept that Donald Trump is never going to learn basic stuff about the world

This story includes two of my favorite things to read about: YouTube star drama AND North Korea!

SIGH: Meeting the Free Speech Crusaders Who Want to End Political Correctness

This this this: Advocating for specific plot twists isn’t meaningful political activism

'We Don’t Need to Be Alone’: A Political Shift Has Poland Assessing Its Values

Here's a great profile of Senator Mikulski.

This defense of the bronze medal is fun.

Kafkaesque instructions on what to do with Franz Kafka’s manuscripts produce a Kafkaesque legal battle

Shifting Sands in Britain Reveal a 100-Year-Old Shipwreck (Not for nothing, but I feel like shifting sands have been revealing more things than usual recently.)

Morning Coffee (8/3/16)

Me elsewhere: On this week's episode of The Fourth Wall, Holly and I - and special guest Katie Moest! - talk Comic-Con.

Here's how Khan's amazing speech happened.

!! Pope Appoints Commission To Study Possibility Of Women As Deacons

Trump’s already got an excuse for a November loss: the election will be “rigged"

Yesterday in Trump: He kicked a crying baby out of a rally, which is obviously a good punchline but the more important part here is that he humiliated and kicked out THE MOTHER just for having a baby who acts like a baby, which is yet another sign of his hatred and disdain for women.

Also yesterday: "I always wanted to get the Purple Heart — this was much easier."

And ICYMI on Monday he called Hillary Clinton the devil.

And so, it begins: The First Republican Member of Congress to Back Hillary Clinton

Also Meg Whitman. Meg Whitman!!

I'm angry about this: Some Bernie delegates say they sold their DNC credentials to anyone with enough cash after he officially lost, which means people could get onto the floor the night Clinton spoke without going through the normal security check. (There was still a metal detector, thank goodness.)

This is not how anything works.