This meme is very very funny, but it is also inviting a serious explainer 🧵 from yours truly about 0 in Sinitic languages (there'll also be something funny later on). 😂 Let's go! 1/

Will you still need me, will you still feed me, when I'm 94? Happy Birthday Roger.

Read k. x. song | 宋 晶 瑩, _The Night Ends with Fire_ on my flight home. Good enough to pass on to Ms17, although I know she’ll wince, as I did, at the translation of 青 as “azure” rather than “verdant”. “Azure” maybe is 天藍, although that’s not really right for a sea dragon either.

americanair we’ve been on the plane on the ground in PHL for almost 3 hours. The crew is making announcements that inspire zero confidence. Our plane feels forgotten. Unacceptable.

Barchilon American Go Association, Jake Jinhoo Kim named Teacher of the Year usgo.org/content.aspx?p… Great to see this recognition for one of Ms17's friends!

.Chris Buckley 儲百亮, Xi Looks to Tighten Grip After Scandals Shake China’s Military Elite nytimes.com/2025/08/10/wor… "3/7 seats on the Central Military Commission...appear to be vacant after members were arrested or simply disappeared."

.Andrew Erickson 艾立信, "There is no detectable delay or scaling back [in Chinese naval operations]"

.Lizzie Dearden, Wildfire at Edinburgh Landmark, Arthur’s Seat, Brought Under Control nytimes.com/2025/08/11/wor… "The blaze followed months of unusually warm weather and lower than average rainfall in Scotland."

The sad thing is that there are countless competent, respected conservative economists (especially at universities) who could do a terrific job running BLS. But no credible economist would take a job in which you'd get fired for publishing accurate data. Alas...

This is one of the many elementary errors that show me Mr Antoni is unqualified for the labor market data collection and analysis role he was nominated to. People will discuss credentials but what matters is whether you know what you're talking about.

#DontAbandonThem

Jazzed to be joining the faculty at the Tin House Autumn Workshop this year — and what an amazing lineup indeed 😍

What an amazing way to end our first summer of live music! Thanks so much to a brilliant audience at Crampton Tower & the lovely team & volunteers #BroadstairsFolkFestival who've helped us find our feet. Here’s a clip of our version of “Wild Mountain Thyme” - see ya after hols x

The character 帠 appears in only once in all of history, in a single line of the text Zhuangzi 莊子, Yin di wang 應帝王: 汝又何帠以治天下感予之心爲？ How 帠 you again trouble my heart [talking about] governing the world? Smells like yet another glyph error. Let's find out! /1

.Jakob McWhinney, Enrollment Decline Can’t Be Explained Away by Shift to Private Schools, Homeschooling voiceofsandiego.org/2025/08/15/enr… "not much educators can do, because the main engines of the drops – declining birth rates & sky-high costs of living – are largely out of their control"

Tao, I’m an award-winning mathematician. Trump just cut my funding. newsletter.ofthebrave.org/p/im-an-award-… "appeals to long-term national interests, such as the development of future tech or the training of the next generation of leading scientists, fall on deaf ears at the current admin"

Saw two rattlesnakes on my run today, and I only went about 5K.