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Sunday, March 18, 2018

More Sac Love

An excerpt from the Washington Post -

You’re going where? Sacramento
By Megan McDonough

California’s capital city has long lived in the shadows of its flashier neighbors. Sandwiched between San Francisco and Lake Tahoe, “Sac,” as the locals call it, is often underestimated and overlooked as a small and sleepy cow town — a rest stop on the way to greener and glitzier pastures. But thanks to the downtown revitalization and the rousing success of “Lady Bird” — Greta Gerwig’s Oscar-nominated homage to her home town — Sacramento has been suddenly, and rightfully, thrust into the spotlight.

Following in the footsteps of the Forty-Niners , I came to Sacramento with the aim of striking it rich. My mission: to mine the city’s treasures while home for the holidays in December. Technically, I was born in Sacramento, but I grew up about 20 minutes away in Davis. And while my teenage self would make regular pilgrimages to the city’s thrift stores and shopping centers, I didn’t fully appreciate what the City of Trees had to offer.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/classic-apps/youre-going-where-sacramento/2018/03/14/3aaf23ce-20bf-11e8-94da-ebf9d112159c_story.html?utm_term=.3d7554376760

Quote

When the full extent of your venality, moral turpitude, and political corruption becomes known, you will take your rightful place as a disgraced demagogue in the dustbin of history. You may scapegoat Andy McCabe, but you will  not destroy America...America will triumph over you. - Ex-CIA Boss John Brennan

SacTown Innovators

An excerpt from SacTown Magazine -

Local eye-care company launches new line of fitness-tracking spectacles
BY HILLARY LOUISE JOHNSON

Step into The Shop, the midtown innovation lab for local eye care giant VSP Global, and you’re in nerd heaven, a place where kids who were called “four-eyes” in high school exact sweet revenge by changing the world through technology. Take Level, for instance: a new line of fitness-tracking glasses developed by The Shop and tested by 300 individuals through USC’s Center for Body Computing.

The project was conceived four years ago, but was so ahead of its time that the team had to wait for chip technology to get smaller and more economical. “It could be no more expensive than any other pair of glasses," says the lab’s co-director Jay Sales. "On top of that, it had to be fashionable—as elegant as it is effective.” Level’s sleek $270 frames currently come in three styles, named after innovators Nikola Tesla, Marvin Minsky and Hedy Lamarr.

http://www.sactownmag.com/Style-Watch/2018/Level-up-with-VSPs-new-fitness-tracking-eyewear/



Saturday, March 17, 2018

On the List of Things To Do

An excerpt from ProPublica -

The FBI — ‘Fidelity, Bravery, Integrity’ — Still Working on Diversity
The nation’s top federal law enforcement agency is overwhelmingly white, and its top officials acknowledge that’s “a huge operational risk.”
by Topher Sanders

For the FBI, the longstanding failure to diversify its ranks is nothing short of “a huge operational risk,” according to one senior official, something that compromises the agency’s ability to understand communities at risk, penetrate criminal enterprises, and identify emerging national security threats.

Indeed, 10 months before being fired as director of the FBI by President Trump, James Comey called the situation a “crisis.”

“Slowly but steadily over the last decade or more, the percentage of special agents in the FBI who are white has been growing,” Comey said in a speech at Bethune-Cookman University, a historically black school in Daytona Beach, Florida. “I’ve got nothing against white people — especially tall, awkward, male white people — but that is a crisis for reasons that you get, and that I’ve worked very hard to make sure the entire FBI understands.”

https://www.propublica.org/article/the-fbi-fidelity-bravery-integrity-still-working-on-diversity?utm_source=pardot&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=dailynewsletter

Good From Evil

From the Washington Post -

I posted a huge note for the thief who stole my bike. Then my doorbell rang.
By Amanda Needham


https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/inspired-life/wp/2018/03/16/i-posted-a-huge-note-for-the-thief-who-stole-my-bike-then-my-doorbell-rang/?utm_term=.1b18bbde70f7

#NeverAgain

Friday, March 16, 2018

Japan’s DJ Monk Spins the Holiest Beats

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How 29,000 Lost Rubber Ducks Helped Map the World's Oceans

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Explore the Valley Protecting Hawaii’s Ancient Plants

STEM is a Necessity

An excerpt from the Huffington Post -

Mae Jemison: Diversity In STEM Isn’t A Nicety, It’s A Necessity
The first African-American woman in space discusses her agricultural science initiative.
By Taylor Pittman

Dr. Mae Jemison, the first African-American woman in space, knows firsthand the importance of exposing kids to STEM topics early. She also knows the significance of having kids see themselves in movies, on TV, and in certain careers.

“It means making sure that people get those images that show they have those things available to them,” Jemison told HuffPost.

Jemison is collaborating on “Science Matters,” an initiative to encourage kids of all ages and backgrounds to pursue agricultural science from pharmaceutical and life science company Bayer and youth development organization National 4-H Council. Jemison, a physician and chemical engineer, knows the field of agricultural science can sound intimidating, but she and Jennifer Sirangelo, CEO and president of the National 4-H Council, have set out to change that.

https://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/mae-jemison-diversity-in-stem_us_5aa820ade4b001c8bf147eae