Welcome to Corgi-Class Starship, the newsletter that recognizes the oddness of this position but nevertheless laments what seems like the early return of spring around these parts already

You'll Like This

Update(s) on thing(s) I made or somehow helped to bring about.

Instant Band Night 13 Going On 30

You have got to get in on this one, friends. At this point I think it may be safe to say we have a couple of regular attendees who bring their brass (trumpet and sax, to be precise) and their presence truly elevates both the proceedings in general and the variety of acts. Do not miss this if you value joy and creativity in your life!! There's no pressure to perform — you can simply join the almost ferociously friendly crowd in their appreciation for each wild new band that appears! Also, word to the wise: we're going for an 80s theme for this one, so dig out your brightest neon clothes. Trust me on this one!!

✨🪩✨
March 13 2025
6p
$10
East Bay Community Space
507 55th St 94609

(Eventbrite) (Facebook)

+ + T E L L + Y O U R + F R I E N D S + +
+ + S E E + Y O U + T H E R E + +

Surprising and Unique Ceramics For YOU

If you've been looking for a weird little guy to put in your garden, potted plant, or kitchen, then I have the perfect place to start your search. If you know someone else who needs a weird little guy for their garden, potted plant, or kitchen, then you're also in luck!!!!

Idea Factory Giveaway

I think it's probably safe to say the podcast is on hiatus after three+ years of inactivity, but I'm putting a link to its evergreen Apple Podcasts presence here, which includes a back catalog over 150 episodes long chock-full of excellent ridiculousness, including an experimental tabletop RPG and a couple of Star Trek fantasy drafts that could almost be their own show if I had the time to make yet another podcast

Medium Ramble

Skippable if you're in a hurry.

The opossum story from last week sparked a question whose answer I really only want from primary, firsthand sources: are opossums soft? Judging by the pictures in the article, it looks like this opossum might be soft, but I have been tricked before: we need not relitigate the betrayal of the wombat, whose pictures make them out to be cuddly but whose fur (according to people who've physically touched them) turns out to be wiry. I will never forget the account from a friend who pet a tiger once and told me it was actually kind of ........ sticky?? One more piece of evidence, as if any were needed, confirming the untrustworthiness of tigers in general, inasmuch as they're just big ol' cats. Like cats, but do not trust cats, is my motto here. I'm getting off-track. Someone tell me whether opossums are soft or not. Raccoons, too, while we're at it!!!

#dadthoughts

Also skippable if you're in a hurry or don't care. No judgment.

We hit upon a very good Weekend Plan over this past weeklong break from school for Quentin* that I unfortunately cannot advise on replicating for anyone who doesn't live in or near our exact zipcode, but want to preserve for the sake of posterity:

1. Pack a lunch and the stroller and drive to the Richmond ferry stop to catch the 950a ferry

2. Arrive at the Ferry Building in San Francisco

3. Walk to the Exploratorium (mostly pushing Felix in the stroller)

4. Partake in the wonders of the Exploratorium

5. Have lunch somewhere in there

6. Depart around 130p to ensure a leisurely walk back to catch the 205p ferry back

7. Drive home, finish out the day

It's great because

• The kids love riding the ferry and why wouldn't they! It's a big boat! It goes fast! The snack bar sometimes has Doritos!

• Everybody gets a nice walk in, but crucially we can offer Felix an option for not walking so he doesn't get tired after a block and demand that we carry him the entire rest of the way

• The Exploratorium fucking rules

• In terms of distance traveled, cost of fare, and time, the ferry is kind of an amazing way to do this trip, and the Richmond ferry is almost never significantly crowded at the hours we take it

I highly recommend it if this is something that's at all within your abilities!!

* They call it President's Week, but informally it's known as "ski week" which I guess works out great for the people who like skiing???? Fortunately the city of El Cerrito does a day camp for kids that takes place during the exact hours of school/work, may they be showered with a million blessings.

Fascination Corner

I read a lot of newsletters; here are some links that caught my eye.

• A good update on our friend Luigi; if you hit the paywall on this one, you can circumvent it by putting a period after the ".com" in the URL. (The Verge)

• MacKenzie Scott's philanthropy game is so strong it should be abjectly humiliating for every other rich asshole out there dicking around in the field, and the Center for Effective Philanthropy has a three-year report with all the details. (CEP)

• The Scientists have hit upon a great way to proxy-estimate the biomass of the oceanic twilight zone by looking at the weight of elephant seals. (bioGraphic)

• Please enjoy a thorough and necessary evisceration of Pamela Paul and the "far centrist" mindset from Intelligencer, which I should remind you is another one of those sites whose paywall you can leap by simply putting a period after the ".com" if you've hit their article limit. (Intelligencer)

• All of Trump's bullshit makes sense if you look at him as a mob boss instead of a President. (How Things Work)

• The Scientists think they might've found the brain circuit for creativity. (Mass General Brigham) (Paper)

• Some Engineers have successfully tested a cheap, fast way to 3D print an "electrospray" engine ideal for small satellites, which would be great because it could be made and deployed entirely in orbit without having to wait for anybody to ship one up from the ground. (MIT) (Paper)

• As a sculptor who's been compelled by forces unknown to make weird little mushrooms for a while now, the Game of Shrooms seems very weirdly serendipitous. Right??? (Game of Shrooms)

• Phase I trials of an mRNA vaccine to prevent the recurrence of pancreatic cancer look good; alas that Iain M. Banks could not have lived to see this day. (Sloan Kettering) (Paper)

• What kinds of fossils will our garbage make? (The Conversation)

• "Thirty lonely but beautiful actions you can take right now which probably won't magically catalyze a mass movement against Trump but that are still wildly important" (The White Pages)

• Instead of making you fill out a food diary, The Scientists have worked out a way to just analyze the metagenome of your poop to find out what you ate, which is wild. (Inst for Systems Biology)

• Some Engineers have hit upon a printable, compostable plastic alternative made from used coffee grounds and fungus. Pretty cool actually!! Give the paper a read, it's fascinating. (U of Washington) (Paper)

• You might've heard about that Microsoft announcing a big quantum computer breakthrough; here's what it actually means (The Conversation), although The Scientists aren't exactly convinced. (Nature)

• Oh nooooooooo there are so many Severance rabbitholes to disappear down (TechCrunch)

• Wild fish can tell individual people apart by the gear they're wearing and can recognize people they like (the ones who feed them). (Max Planck Inst of Animal Behavior) (Paper)

• If we can keep making Cybertrucks social poison to own, the brand itself might become sufficiently devalued enough to really cost Elon some money; would that not be beautiful? (How Things Work)

• Sounds like pears are going to be thin on the ground for a while, folks. (Food Dive)

• The Scientists linked four telescopes together to assemble a 3D picture of the atmosphere of an exoplanet 900ly away! (European Southern Observatory)

• Apparently this is just something they're doing now? Some Engineers have made serious advances in "bio-hybrid drones" that incorporate literal silkworm moth antennae to navigate by smell. (Shinshu U) (Paper)

• Putting a lot of scented products in your house is probably polluting the shit out of the air in there, folks. (Purdue U) (Paper)

• Evolution itself is capable of evolving, say The Scientists. Okay!!! (U Michigan) (Paper)

• You and I know it but it's worth saying out loud that "The war on DEI is a smoke screen: MAGA’s attacks on ‘wokeness’ and diversity, equity, and inclusion are a thinly veiled attack on the Civil Rights Movement itself." (The Verge)

• The Scientists have done the math and report that the universe doesn't actually care which way time flows. (U of Surrey) (Paper)

• Oof: Humane didn't even make it a full year. (TechCrunch)

• While we're at it, here's your Ed Zitron read for the week if you aren't already subscribed to his newsletter, which to be honest you oughta be by now. (Where's Your Ed At)

• I seriously am this close to diving through the archive for the past year and seeing how many of these devices pop up: Some Engineers have created yet another solar-powered machine that can pull CO2 from the air and turn it into a useful fuel precursor. (U of Cambridge) (Paper) And look, here's another one!!! (Yale)

• Some Engineers built a relatively cheap and simple laser-based sensor that can identify the components in any gas sample down to parts per trillion. Damn, okay!! (CU Boulder)

• The Scientists may have found the gene responsible for the emergence of language in humans. What?? (Rockefeller U) (Paper)

• Life on a planet orbiting a white dwarf star sounds insane, but is theoretically possible according to The Scientists. (UC Irvine) (Paper)

• Cotton-poly blends are impossible to recycle because of being, well, blends, but The Scientists think they've found a way to make it happen! (Anthropocene) (Paper)

A Fictional Thing

Something made-up that somehow suggested itself to me and which I could not escape.

A band and their album

(I remembered a formula for making fake album covers that involves searching for a random appropriately licensed photo and then applying your best Graphic Design Skills to the result; let me know what you think this band/album sounds like, because your answers are always incredible)

New Music Roundup

Last week's band/album was:

No reader interpretations came in for this one, which I think has a bright, clean, spare indie rock sound with butter-smooth vocals along the lines of Kings of Convenience or thereabouts.

Thanks

If you've read this far, I thank you. Feel free to forward this to someone you like, or inflict upon someone you don't. If you received this as a forward and would like to subscribe yourself, you can do it at the bottom of this page right here (which also has the archive)!