This week's photo is of a stand of e-scooters ready for someone to hop on. I think this is a project of the City, and no, it doesn't compenste for the lack of public transit. I have no urge to try one; my eyes and my balance preclude that.
This week's musical treat features the great Canadian singer-songwriter, Stan Rogers, who tragically died in an Air Canada airplane fire in Cincinnati in 1983. The recording is of a famous concert at the Rebecca Cohn Auditorium in Halifax, NS in 1982 that was broadcast nationally on CBC radio. I remember listening to it when I was living in Alberta.
I knew Stan from when I was living in Hamilton in the early 1970s and was lucky to see him perform many times as his career developed from performing in coffee houses to becoming a national folk music icon. Most of the concert was released after his death on the album, Home in Halifax though the version here has several songs not on the album.
1:25 Witch of the Westmoreland
6:26 White Collar Holler
9:10-13:21 Field behind the Plow
16:41-19:45 Night Guard
22:59 - 25:40 The Idiot
26:24 - 32:00 Lies
32:52 - 36:19 Workin' Joe
39:25 - 42:47 The Giant
45:50 - 49:31 Dark Eyed Molly
49:43 - 55:10 Northwest Passage
57:25 - 1:02:04 The Last Watch
1:05:12 - 1:10:00 The Mary Ellen Carter
1:11:16 - 1:15:17 Barrett's Privateers
1:17:00 - 1:22:27 Sailor's Rest
If you don't know Stan's music, you're in for a treat. I particularly recommend "Lies", a song that still makes me weepy, and the anthemic "Northwest Passage".
It's well past time for another one of these posts.
This post is a collection of links that support my increasingly strong feeling that the human race (or at least our technological civilization) is doomed.
The emerging danger of post-hurricane heat waves. "With global warming making people increasingly dependent on air conditioning, power failures from hurricanes followed by heat waves are creating increasingly hazardous risks to health."
Sustaining the Unsustainable. "Trump’s spectacle of force cannot hide the truth: America is meeting the appetites of the present by stripping future generations of stability, dignity, and hope."
Earth's Population Has Surpassed The Planet's Capacity, Study Suggests. "Based on more than two centuries of population data, a team led by Corey Bradshaw of Flinders University in Australia found humanity is living well beyond the bounds of what our planet can support long-term."
Things I found interesting but didn't want to do a full blog post about.
Docks waiting for summer
The Cascadia Subduction zone isn’t shutting down – but it’s more complicated than we thought. "But while the discovery is real, the interpretation that the subduction zone is winding down gets ahead of the science. What the new research actually shows is far more complex — and more interesting. But before we can understand what this tear means, we need to go back to plate tectonic theory."
Helium Is Hard to Replace. "One such supply chain that’s suddenly getting a lot of attention is helium. Helium is produced as a byproduct of natural gas extraction: it collects in the same underground pockets that natural gas collects in. Qatar is responsible for roughly 1/3rd of the world’s supply of helium, which was formerly transported through the Strait of Hormuz in specialized containers. Thanks to the closure of the strait, helium prices have spiked, suppliers are declaring force majeure, and businesses are scrambling to deal with looming shortages."
Trump, Pope Leo and the Lessons of 1933. "There is no way that in this new age of fascist threat, the Church is going to forget the lesson of the Reich Concordat."
Yellowstone's magma source may be closer than thought, reshaping hazard models. "Now, a research team from the Institute of Geology and Geophysics of the Chinese Academy of Sciences (IGGCAS) has developed a comprehensive three-dimensional geodynamic model of western North America that simulates the present-day dynamics of both the lithosphere and the underlying convecting mantle, revealing a mechanism for magma generation beneath supervolcanoes."
This founder helped build SpaceX’s most powerful rocket engine. Now he’s building a ‘fighter jet for orbit.’ "The company is developing a technology called solar thermal propulsion. Today’s standard satellite engines either burn chemical fuel or convert the sun’s energy to electricity, using that to power efficient but low-powered thrusters. Portal’s engines would instead concentrate the heat of the sun, using that to heat propellant and move the spacecraft along at high speed."
The top 10 finalists for the 2026 Locus Awards have been announced. The awards are voted on by subscribers to Locus Magazine and will be announced on May 30.
These are the finalists for best science fiction novel.
The Folded Sky, Elizabeth Bear (Saga; Gollancz)
Picks & Shovels, Cory Doctorow (Ad Astra; Tor)
Notes from a Regicide, Isaac Fellman (Tor)
When We Were Real, Daryl Gregory (Saga)
All That We See or Seem, Ken Liu (Saga; Ad Astra)
Where the Axe Is Buried, Ray Nayler (MCD; Weidenfel & Nicolson)
Slow Gods, Claire North (Orbit US; Orbit UK)
Death of the Author, Nnedi Okorafor (Morrow; Gollancz)
The Shattering Peace, John Scalzi (Tor; Tor UK)
Shroud, Adrian Tchaikovsky (Tor UK; Orbit US)
I've only read the Ray Nayler novel, though there are three or four on the list that I plan to read at some point.
You can read most of the short story and novelette finalists online with links provided in the article.
The winners of the 2026 World Press Photo Contest have been announced. They present "outstanding work from photojournalists and documentary photographers worldwide, connecting global audiences to the most pressing stories of our time."
I'll have to keep an eye out to see if they will be displayed in Toronto. I've seen a couple of the contest winners' exhibitions and it's definitely the best way to see them.
Amateur Photographer has an article that displays some of the most striking photos in a larger format than the contest website.
This week's photo is of a wheelchair ramp on the Lake Ontario waterfront in Pickering. There is a raised walkway along the beach with ramps leading down to the sand and this ramp.
