It's a nice day out. Anyway, back to the Internet 
Happy invoicing!
- Women wanted to fly jets in combat. Breaking that barrier would be the fight of their lives. - ”In the early 1990s, few corners of the military were as misogynistic as the world of fighter pilots. This is the story of the women Navy officers who overcame that culture to fly the formidable F-14.”
- The Tiny Physics Behind Immense Cosmic Eruptions - ”A new theory describes how particle interactions fuel fast magnetic reconnection, the process behind solar flares and other astrophysical jets.” The Universe continues to be weird
- I Asked ChatGPT To Control My Life, and It Immediately Fell Apart - ”Within minutes of my decision to hand my life over to AI, ChatGPT suggested that, if able, I should go outside and play with my dog instead of work… After 35 years of living in relative control of my decisions, I had decided to see what would happen if I asked AI to control my life instead. Years of suboptimal performance, both personally and professionally, and numerous failed attempts at self-improvement had convinced me there had to be a better way.” I reckon it got the dog one right
- Orb.Farm - ”Welcome to Orb.Farm! This is your personal aquatic ecosystem to nurture, sculpt, and observe.” Mine kept ending up with too little oxygen, but maybe you can do better
- The Last Bird of Its Kind, Singing for a Mate That Will Never Come, is the Saddest Thing Ever - HT to DoctorStrangelove for this one: ”In 1987 the last Kauaʻi ʻōʻō was male, and his song was recorded for the Cornell Lab of Ornithology. The male was recorded singing a mating call to a female that would never come.”
- Think you can land a plane? We put average people to the test. - ”Many Americans think they could land a plane if they had to step in for a commercial pilot… Brett Venhuizen, professor of aviation and chair of the aviation department at the University of North Dakota, in Grand Forks, suggested a way to test the aspirational pilots’ bravado: Stick them in one of the school’s flight simulators.” This went about as well as could be expected
- A Memorable Fright - Speaking of landings: ”Almost everyone in the aircraft industry and thousands beyond has heard of the RAF Engineering Officer who inadvertently found himself airborne in a Lightning. Wg Cdr Taffy Holden - 47th Craft Apprentice Entry - the very man, was so fed up hearing his story told and retold with fanciful variations on the actuality, he decided to write the definitive account of his very enlightening experience.”
- The Greatest 100 Tracks of Over 7 Minutes Duration - Some great tunes in here: ”Making a song last for this duration is a venture fraught with danger which should not be undertaken lightly. Essentially, for the listener, lengthy songs need to be handled in much the same way as a well-refreshed guest; if they start to ramble aimlessly, repeat themselves unnecessarily or generally outstay their welcome, then it’s time for them to go. If, on the other hand, they continue to hold you rapt with charismatic presence and engaging storytelling, then let’s open another bottle.”
- New record set for fastest trip through entirety of NYC subway - ”New York City’s subway has 472 stations laid out across 665 miles of track. For decades, transit enthusiasts have jockeyed to set the record for the fastest time to travel through the whole system.” Remarkably, Kate Jones took the record only a few months after suffering a broken ankle
- Strangely Familiar: Visitors’ Views of Britain Since The 1930s - ”To see yourself as others see you is a gift. These pictures by international photographers reflect how they saw the place on visits to Britain since the 1930s.” These shots featured in an exhibition at the Barbican in 2016, Strange and Familiar: Britain as Revealed by International Photographers. This photo by Henri Cartier-Bresson was taken in Trafalgar Square on the occasion of the Coronation of George VI.
Happy invoicing!
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