Yucca filamentosa is a fascinating plant.

Scott “bell beaker” Cave@hellabarnes.bsky.social · 2d ago

we assume that yucca didn’t get around on its own in Virginia and was spread by people. it would be cool to use genetics to see where the source populations were and how they spread

On the coop's free shelf. (I appreciate the candor.)

This is the piece about the DC streatery program that I've been looking for, and it bears out a lot of my hunches: yes, the application requirements are more stringent, but some restaurants submitted bad proposals or simply have different preferences. dc.citycast.fm/business-dev...

See Where Streateries Survive in D.C. – And Why So Many Disappeared · City Cast DC

Restaurants resisted. The city government dug in. What if everyone was right?

dc.citycast.fm

Up in Mt. Pleasant, Purple Patch has a new streatery, which looks to be in line with the new DC rules. Much smaller than the old streatery, which extended in front of other properties.

I used my portfolio (bag) for the first time in ages—found these in the bottom. The plan, which was folded up, is from my RISD MFA portfolio presentation, 20 years ago. Colored scraps are from trimming a letterpress project down, and that's waxed thread for bookbinding.

If you've been horrified by the Google Earth "make stuff up" button, know that your smartphone camera combines images and makes stuff up too, if more quietly and with less spectacle.

David Ramos@imagineterrain.bsky.social · 5d ago

I doubt most people understand what's going on w. computational photography (smartphones, esp. Android)—default camera apps silently combine multiple exposures and even make stuff up. But there are apps like Halide that turn this off, and Sony now sells a camera that cryptographically signs images.

Gorgeous cabinet card from my collection, likely 1890s.

Over on the Inner Harbor Forum FB group, Baltimoreans have been using GenAI tools to visualize their ideas for how the rebuilt Inner Harbor should look, in opposition to the redevelopment proposals. I should be cheering the democratization of tools, but cheap ideas are also corrosive.

Google Earth (web) now lets you use Gen AI to alter aerial photos. It's shiny, but this is a place where friction is beneficial—it should be harder to alter an already composite vision of reality, and it should be slower to conjure up uncanny valley architectural visualizations.

Faine Greenwood@faineg.bsky.social · 5d ago

I used to do some work on the ethical use of satellite and drone imagery for aid and disaster response, and it is genuinely hard to express in words what a dangerous, stupid thing Google is doing by making it easy to use GenAI to create faked satellite imagery:

A map of Earth’s underground fungi network, estimated to be “110 quadrillion kilometers less than 10 centimeters underground.”

Map — A hidden infrastructure

Interactive global map of mycorrhizal fungal hyphal density — the underground networks beneath our feet.

a-hidden-infrastructure.spun.earth

Not only do Baltimore Banner reporters use a handheld mic, the paper's even added their own mic flag to the handle like they're a traditional broadcast org. (No halfwitted hold-the-lavalier-with-your-fingertips influencer imitation here!)

On the ICPRB and making space for eels along the Potomac River. ggwash.org/view/104238/...

How governments, advocates, and eels affect the Washington region’s water

Before it reaches DC taps, water flows through small villages, slows over dams, cools under forested state and national parks, picks up the remnants of abandoned industrial sites, and is shaped by the...

ggwash.org

A wonderful series of sections, showing the route of a proposed canal along the Potomac River. By Benjamin Henry Latrobe, drawn by Nicholas King, 1803.

What about outdoor pools on public land? In DC, there are 28 publicly-owned sites with outdoor swimming pools, mostly Dept. of Parks and Recreation facilities, but there are also pools at JBAB, the White House, and the Police Academy.

I think that this plat is the earliest depiction of a spring in Washington, D.C., other than L'Enfant's earlier, smaller-scale "Dotted Line Map," which shows important springs as point features.

David Ramos@imagineterrain.bsky.social · last wk.

This is one of the King Plats, the earliest precise surveys of DC, showing the home of Daniel Carroll of Duddington, between the Capitol and the Navy Yard. It shows a spring! And a springhouse, and a little channel flowing off to the southwest.

This is one of the King Plats, the earliest precise surveys of DC, showing the home of Daniel Carroll of Duddington, between the Capitol and the Navy Yard. It shows a spring! And a springhouse, and a little channel flowing off to the southwest.

In Lanier Heights, the rain is heavy enough that visibility is down to about 1/8 mile.

the east coast was not a continuous unbroken forest and there’s no evidence that it was

ETX Gov@etxgov.myatproto.social · last wk.

You've got a captive audience on a plane, and you know they can't open the doors and yeet you out. What subject are you gonna do a 30 minute sermon on?

The Newsroom, a Dupont Circle newsstand, is still going! Might be the only establishment of its type remaining in DC. www.nytimes.com/2026/06/20/u...

Can a Seller of Yesterday’s News Avoid Becoming It? A Newsstand in D.C. Tries. (Gift Article)

The Newsroom, overflowing with magazines and newspapers on mismatched shelves, has endured as a symbol of a different Washington.

nytimes.com

Just coming across the "Return to Wymer's DC" site, a interface to John P. Wymer's 1948–1952 photos of street scenes in the District, developed by Jessica and Thomas Smith. (There are 4,000+ photos, presented on maps w. modern imagery!) map.wymersdc.com#WY2237

An experiment: I put a folding kayak on a bike trailer and rode down to Georgetown Waterfront Park, and put in from the (monumental) steps there. Worked out well, though I had to come back early—launched under an SCA and the wind started picking up.

Where are DC's outdoor swimming pools? Here's a map showing 1,900 of them. If you break out pools by zoning, a good 90% of them are in the lower-density residential zones—but more surprisingly, people've squeezed 154 pools into the higher-density zones.

An undated view of the Capitol Building from the Anacostia. Photo by John K. Hillers (known for his work out West) for USGS. I think the arrow-shaped plant is tuckahoe. If that's the S and W fronts of the Capitol, this has to be James Creek and the Ft. McNair wall beyond, but the angle's odd.

DC evening commute 16th St NW is currently shut down by the fire department at Irving, and there are more than a dozen northbound D60 busses standing at the curb, and more southbound.

The Post looks more closely at why DC restaurants are pulling their streateries—a slow and unclear multi-agency permit process, and cost, esp. for traffic barriers and design professionals. wapo.st/44QjKwV

Outdoor eating spaces became a fixture of D.C. dining. Now they are disappearing.

Business owners say the red tape and requirements of building permanent ‘streateries’ are burdensome and expensive.

wapo.st

Pond near the Middle Patuxsnt River, Paruxent Research Refuge. I think the green is algae rather than duckweed.

One unleashes the *hounds* of Hell, not the gates of Hell, you illiterate moron.

There is an unofficial video channel from RCAF 103 Search and Rescue Squadron, which flies helicopters out of Gander, NL. Well-made, insightful videos. I'm struck by the vast distances involved, and by the quiet, easygoing skill of the crews. www.youtube.com/@mattfrom103

Mattfrom103

This is an unofficial channel showing videos of all the hard work 103 SAR Squadron in Gander, Newfoundland, Canada does. 103 Sqn is a Royal Canadian Airforce SAR Squadron that flies the CH-149 Cormo...

youtube.com

Astonishingly, Bruce Schneier thinks that anything that is work is not art; and that creative work that has a function can be automated away without any loss. www.theguardian.com/commentisfre...

Should you use AI for a task? Here’s a simple way to decide | Bruce Schneier

Sometimes, what matters isn’t your output but what you put into the process. Think of it like work v the gym

theguardian.com

My last story about DC for a while: Trying to figure out why buses slowing down 51st.news/metro-tried-...

Metro tried to make bus service better. Somehow, ridership and speeds are both down

A year after Better Bus, reviews are mixed.

51st.news