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Dr. Stephanie @punkrockscience.bsky.social · 11h

More reasons to stay away from twitter: saying the replies to this are an absolute trash fire is too mean to trash fires.

Screenshot of a post from @CDCgov on twitter:

“CDC is aware of and closely monitoring reports of a suspected case of pneumonic plague in the Irkutsk region of Russia that resulted in a death.
We are working across the U.S. government to assess developments as additional information becomes available.
While the circumstances of this reported case remain unconfirmed, plague is a serious bacterial disease that is treatable with antibiotics, particularly when recognized and treated early.
Pneumonic plague can spread person-to-person through respiratory droplets during close contact, which is why rapid identification and treatment of infected individuals, and monitoring of potentially exposed individuals, are important public health measures.
At this time, there is no indication of a broader threat to the United States, but CDC and our interagency partners are prepared and will continue to monitor the situation closely.

Last edited 2:03 PM

10/6/26 from Earth

5.8M Views
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Dr. Stephanie @punkrockscience.bsky.social · 06/10/2026

Day 2 of trying to eat a bagel before I get interrupted by bullshit. Do we think I’ll make it today, or will we be seeing bagel return for day 3?

An everything bagel with butter on a plate. Behind it is a laptop on a stand and a coffee mug with an Effin Birds image (an ostrich and the text “oh joy, another dipshit who thinks he understands my area of expertise”

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Dr. Stephanie @punkrockscience.bsky.social · 04/10/2026

I love my spinies! I got these other two recently that I’ve yet to find a good home for display.

Two spiny oysters (Spondylus spp.). One is a brownish-mauve with dark-red spines, and the other is a lighter pinkish purple with a white outer margin and pale pink spines

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Dr. Stephanie @punkrockscience.bsky.social · 04/10/2026

Ah, that’s another sea biscuit - that one’s from Hawaii. It was actually octopus-predated - see those round holes in the top?

Me holding the sea biscuit in question, freshly found, in a rental car in Maui. It’s about the size of a very large grapefruit and mottled with tan and greyish-purple patterns

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Dr. Stephanie @punkrockscience.bsky.social · 04/10/2026

I need some whole new kind of furniture just to hold her murexes and pagoda shells. They’re too beautiful and delicate to put in a box. I did add the exceptional rose-branch murex (Chicoreus palmarosae) right now, because I can’t stop looking at it.

A large, delicate murex shell, with light and dark brown stripes and elaborately frilled spines that tend toward light pink at the tips

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Dr. Stephanie @punkrockscience.bsky.social · 04/10/2026

The one in blue actually has a bigger sibling standing up behind it - the biggest intact one I’ve ever found (snagged snorkeling, and I *still* screamed).

A shelf of some sand dollars, the butt end of a helmet, and a large angel wing shell

The big sand dollar in my hand, with just my fingertips and the bottom edge of my palm visible

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Dr. Stephanie @punkrockscience.bsky.social · 04/10/2026

The one in the red circle, or the one in blue? The red circle is a fat sea biscuit (Clypeaster rosaceus) from the Florida Keys - as if you blew a sand dollar up like a balloon.

Zoomed version of the previous cabinet , with two shells circled

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Dr. Stephanie @punkrockscience.bsky.social · 04/10/2026

Finally got some curation in after recent estate sales.

A large china cabinet very, very full of shells, coral, and rocks

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Dr. Stephanie @punkrockscience.bsky.social · 03/10/2026

Go to an outdoor concert in October, they said. It’ll be fine, they said.

Screenshot of Weather Underground app for Columbia MD, showing rain, a feels-like temperature of 59F, and “today’s temperature is forecast to be MUCH COOLER than yesterday”

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Dr. Stephanie @punkrockscience.bsky.social · 28/09/2026

It was the two-headed turtle I saw first - but every animal in that tree is AI-artifacted beyond belief.

Zoomed “tree of life” with a weird headless bird, an eight-legged beetle, a green… something? dragon?, and a two-headed, six-legged turtle

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Dr. Stephanie @punkrockscience.bsky.social · 28/09/2026

Exhibit 284029: Google’s AI has now ingested this case and yet is still reporting the incorrect date of 1 Sept.

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Dr. Stephanie @punkrockscience.bsky.social · 27/09/2026

Trying a new recipe tonight: red curry short ribs.

An instant pot with a dark red liquid and visible short rib bones

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Dr. Stephanie @punkrockscience.bsky.social · 27/09/2026

I made some this year, and it’s sooooo good, especially for how easy it is to make. I’ve been putting it on pancakes and in cocktails, but I hadn’t thought of cider.

A large glass jar full of equal parts dark brown sugar and green baby pinecones

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Dr. Stephanie @punkrockscience.bsky.social · 25/09/2026

These would be great for mail art - they’re nicely opaque and shiny even over dark colors and they don’t run if you get them wet.

Brush pen swatches over white paper and a printed image of a rocky cliff by the sea

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Dr. Stephanie @punkrockscience.bsky.social · 25/09/2026

I just got an *extremely* satisfying set of metallic brush pens - the line at the bookstore was long - and my inner twelve-year old is pleased.

A set of “Bright Ideas” metallic brush pens leaning against a stack of books. There’s copper, red, pink, purple, blue, green, gold, and silver

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Dr. Stephanie @punkrockscience.bsky.social · 22/09/2026

Also, ol’ Jerothmul is responsible for the giant monument in the center of Swan Point Cemetery - 55 feet of granite obelisk right in the middle of all the rich East Side graves. I’d always assumed this was just cemetery statuary, not a grave. It’s SO big.

Picture of the Barnaby monument, a huge granite obelisk with an angel on top, in summer amongst trees and bushes

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Dr. Stephanie @punkrockscience.bsky.social · 22/09/2026

Send good vibes for my big old good girl Curie, who has to go for a lumpectomy tomorrow and who’s feeling very hard done by because the humans made her skip dinner.

A large grey-brown Labrador laying on a couch, looking at the camera with a grumpy expression

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Dr. Stephanie @punkrockscience.bsky.social · 21/09/2026

I’ve zoomed in here so people who have not had this nightmare spaghetti inflicted on them can see the arrows for travel direction. And for EXTRA fun times, some of these roads change direction at different times of the day! Everyone who’s ever hated on Boston can stfu - DC was PLANNED like this.

The I-66/Rock Creek Parkway/E St mess behind the Kennedy Center.

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Dr. Stephanie @punkrockscience.bsky.social · 20/09/2026

I see people online wonder how they can tell an original LLBean sail bag from a knockoff or a new, enshittified one. This is how: this bag is 35* years old, has been machine-washed multiple times, is currently soaking wet… and it’s standing on the handles. It’s not starch; it’s quality canvas.

A navy blue and white canvas sail bag standing upside-down in a kitchen sink, drip-drying

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Dr. Stephanie @punkrockscience.bsky.social · 17/09/2026

Somehow that gives serious This Guy vibes, which, honestly, feels right for the “Neil Gaiman is innocent” guy.

A medieval manuscript illustration showing a merman(?) playing a butt trumpet at a figure with a bow

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Dr. Stephanie @punkrockscience.bsky.social · 14/09/2026

I had a pair of these years ago - possibly I still have them, this is not my pic. They were (are) great.

Chuck Taylor “Little Sister” heeled pumps. Black canvas Chucks from the front, heels from the back.

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Dr. Stephanie @punkrockscience.bsky.social · 14/09/2026

I saw a video making fun of these, a folks? WOULD. Would IMMEDIATELY.

A pair of Chuck Taylor high-top black and white… heels. They have a stacked short heel and a pointed toe, but otherwise they’re standard Chucks.

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Dr. Stephanie @punkrockscience.bsky.social · 12/09/2026

Yes, it’s really that color. Yes, of course I got a slice.

An ube fresh cream cake in a case. It’s frosted in loops of a VERY purple frosting dusted with ube sugar powder, with a decorative white chocolate square in the middle

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Dr. Stephanie @punkrockscience.bsky.social · 11/09/2026

Square teal thing, third column - me, please!

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Dr. Stephanie @punkrockscience.bsky.social · 11/09/2026

Could I get more info/prices on both of these, please?

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Dr. Stephanie @punkrockscience.bsky.social · 11/09/2026

Was this ring ever sold, and if no, is it available/what size is it, please?

A ring try holding a ring with a pill-shaped teal agate?-ish stone

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Dr. Stephanie @punkrockscience.bsky.social · 09/09/2026

In this benighted, glue-drenched era, i have often been glad that I no longer work on Apple hardware and don’t have to fix it. Today is the MOST glad I have ever been.

Press pic from engaget of the hinge assembly on the stupid folding iPhone, showing hinges that look AWFUL

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Dr. Stephanie @punkrockscience.bsky.social · 09/09/2026

Is it possible that AI, and specifically LLMs, will allow improvements in drug discovery and testing? Yes. Is this it? I don’t think so.

Screenshot of the “Team” page at Pace Pharmaceuticals, showing three “team members”: Yao, “ChatGPT+Claude”, and an Opentrons OT-2 lab robot as a “lab technician”

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Dr. Stephanie @punkrockscience.bsky.social · 08/09/2026

I don’t think it says that at all. Pretty much the opposite, in fact.

Clip from the article. “honesty from performance. Fielder does not stay behind the lens for long. Drawn into the frame by his subjects and by his own need to interject, he becomes the film's destabilized center — a filmmaker
visibly struggling, in real time, to work out whether he is being played.”

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Dr. Stephanie @punkrockscience.bsky.social · 08/09/2026

It really says something, I think, about the type of men who keep falling for her “helpless” act. None of them want to admit they’re getting conned, especially by someone who’s giving off 12-year-old girl vibes as hard as a 39-year old woman possibly can.

Screenshot from the Variety pice linked above. “Fielder does not stay behind the lens for long. Drawn into the frame by his subjects and by his own need to interject, he becomes the film's destabilized center — a filmmaker visibly struggling, in real time, to work out whether he is being played.”

I can answer that question: Yes, dude, you’re getting played. Like a broke-ass violin.

Elizabeth Holmes, 39, looking at the film’s director. She has careful no-makeup makeup, exaggeratedly wide blue eyes, a cheeky smile that makes her look like a buck-toothed little kid, and her hair tucked “casually” behind her ears

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Dr. Stephanie @punkrockscience.bsky.social · 08/09/2026

I’m so intensely tired of graph after graph after graph looking like this in 2026. Every day is seemingly “now which pathogen has more cases, more quickly, than every previous year?”

Line plot of cumulative measles cases reported in the US by year, showing cases in 2026 are rising more quickly, with more cases MUCH earlier in the year, than in previous years

Line plot of cumulative weekly cyclosporiasis cases in the US by year, showing an almost-vertical increase in week ~25 in 2026, to several thousand more cases than any other year in the plot

Lind plot of Ebola cases in the first 100 days of the 2014, 2018, and 2026 outbreaks. While 2014 and 2018 are comparatively nearly flat and top out at less than 1000 each, the 2026 outbreak is well over 4000 at less than 100 days.

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Dr. Stephanie @punkrockscience.bsky.social · 07/09/2026

Happy Labor Day to all who celebrate.

A block-print style image of a small house with a sign on the door reading “foreclosed”; in the background is a large mansion with columns

Text reads “I am opposing a social order in which it is possible for one man who does absolutely nothing that is usefull to amass a fortune of hundreds of millions of dollars while millions of men and women who work all their lives secure barely enough for a wretched existence.” -Eugene V. Debs, Labor Leader & Socialist Progressive Candidate, June 16, 1918

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Dr. Stephanie @punkrockscience.bsky.social · 06/09/2026

Yep, Marie and Lovelace. Curie is the grey one, and Ada is the brown one.

Two Labrador dogs in a round dog bed: one slightly larger grey one in the back, looking soulfully at the camera, and one smaller dark brown one in the front, chewing on a bone

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Dr. Stephanie @punkrockscience.bsky.social · 04/09/2026

She just hit seven months yesterday, so less Tiny every day, but *very* much a little gremlin menace.

A small chocolate lab puppy, in a large dog bed, looking up from a box she’s shredding as if to say “who, me?”

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Dr. Stephanie @punkrockscience.bsky.social · 04/09/2026

We got Tinydog a new collar, because she somehow managed to chew up the last one. This one felt appropriate.

A teal dog collar resting on the edge of a dog bed. It’s embroidered with “PROBLEM CHILD” in lighter teal letters

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Dr. Stephanie @punkrockscience.bsky.social · 04/09/2026

Is the “Connecticut” a reflection of a southward drag from living in New Jersey and Virginia, or did my Connie mother really pass on that much?

Dialect map of the US, with my accent firmly lodged in New England and “least like me” a dark blue Texas and Louisiana

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Dr. Stephanie @punkrockscience.bsky.social · 01/09/2026

First, they have even fewer living close relatives than the “dire wolves” do. The closest genetic relative to the thylacine is the numbat. Numbats top out at about 45 cm (18”) long, including the tail, so not something that’s going to be a surrogate for a dog-sized thylacine.

A numbat. It’s adorable and stripey, but also quite small and rodent-like (not a rodent). It has a sharp face, short legs, and a fluffy tail

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Dr. Stephanie @punkrockscience.bsky.social · 01/09/2026

Apparently Outlier deleted their account here after they said they used AI (in very vague terms) and got immediate questions and pushback from the community. VERY disappointing. Here’s their update, from their site. (Just reposting, not my opinions, not a defense of it.)

Screenshot of Outlier’s “Does Outlier use AI?” FAQ. It reads:
“Does Outlier use AI?
Yes. Al is one ol many tools we use to build and operate Outlier. We use it to help improve the game, develop new features, troubleshoot and fix bugs, assist with customer support, research ideas, and help with writing and development.
Al doesn't run Outlier or make the final decisions.
The concept, game design, rules, scoring, product direction, and decisions about what becomes part of Outlier are ours. The voice of the game is human designed by us, and Al writes in it rather than inventing it.
We see Al the same way we see other technology: as a tool that helps us work faster, solve problems, and build a better experience for players. It helps us create and improve Outlier, not replace the people behind it.”

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Dr. Stephanie @punkrockscience.bsky.social · 31/08/2026

It feels like someone heard you - it’s “updated” now, but see the second screenshot for how.

The CDC “Measles Cases and Outbreaks” page, 8:52pm ET on August 30, showing an update date of today. The WHAT TO KNOW section reads:
• Updated on August 30, 2026.
• The data on this page reflect confirmed measles cases reported to
CDC as of 12:00PM on Thursday.

Further down the same page, same time as the last one. The “US Deaths” table shows 3 in 2025 and an asterisk in 2026.

The asterisk refers to the following text: “*This week's measles outbreaks update will not include the two measles-associated deaths reported by the Pennsylvania Department of Health on August 25 while CDC reviews additional information regarding the circumstances and causes of death. At this time, available information does not establish whether measles caused or contributed to the deaths or whether the individuals died from other causes while infected with measles. CDC will update the national count as additional information becomes available.”

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Dr. Stephanie @punkrockscience.bsky.social · 29/08/2026

Doing my estate sale lurking this morning, and thanks to @peculiarityshop.bsky.social, I now knew the maker’s mark on the back of this absolute steal Roman glass pendant.

An oval silver pendant in my hand, set with a large piece of Roman glass. It has a dark blue base color and flaky patina in green, pink, light blue, and yellow

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Dr. Stephanie @punkrockscience.bsky.social · 25/08/2026

When I was younger, I wasn’t sold on Dolly Parton - her music wasn’t my style, and that hair! that accent! And then I learned about the books, stopped being such a music snob, and realized optics are the least important things about someone. Thank you for the lessons, ma’am.

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Dr. Stephanie @punkrockscience.bsky.social · 25/08/2026

One of my favorite restaurants, who generally epitomizes the idea of “I don’t ask questions, I trust that all their food is delicious”, has clearly decided to test my commitment to that idea.

Screenshot from an announcement: “Join us for an exclusive evening where the carrot becomes the inspiration for an unexpected multi-course menu, transformed through fire, spice, smoke and technique by Chef [name redacted]”

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