Introducing Arachnofiles

So I’ve joined a new group blog, Arachnofiles! We’re a bunch of spider fans (both arachnologists and amateurs) who are hoping to create some quality stories that go beyond the dreary “creepy-crawly, ugh” angle you see in mainstream media coverage and shed light on current research. You can find the latest Arachnews posts there. And there’s a lot more content, because now we’ve got a group spreadsheet for adding links, and it’s not just one lonely, non-scientist person’s Firefox bookmarks.

I’ll still post updates here when a new post goes up, but if you use Medium, you can also follow Arachnofiles and, uh, engage there. And if you come across any neat spider-related stuff, please send it my way!

Arachnews: April 2019

Featured image: the newly described jumping spider Uroballus carlei resembles a caterpillar. Credit: Stefan Obenauer, iNaturalist.

There’s satire, cake, molecular phylogeny, and more in this round-up of all things arachnid. This month is very jumping spider-heavy—but can you blame me?!

Continue reading Arachnews: April 2019

Independent City Hall Media To Support

So local politics is picking back up after the winter break. We face a challenging budget and provincially-introduced chaos over the fate of the TTC and Ontario Place. As I’m not covering it, I encourage readers to support local independent media instead.

Arianne Robinson’s Signal Toronto is an all-purpose City Hall news site that also puts out a weekly newsletter, with a mix of public and paywalled content. Subscriptions are $5/month.

Matt Elliott has recently launched a newsletter of his own, City Hall Watcher. It’s free until February. Thereafter, subscriptions will be $5/month or $50/year, or free for “journalism school students, other people just getting started covering Toronto City Hall and municipal issue advocates who are not able to afford a subscription.”

I’ve also thrown together a small Twitter list of folks who cover City Hall. (And also a few Queen’s Park reporters, just because.) I may add to it over time.

Okay, now back to hibernation…

Pivoting to Spiders

Note to readers: I am taking a hiatus from the whole City Hall thing. I’ll soon be cancelling all your recurring Paypal donations and putting the Patreon on hold.

It’s not about money or the work or anything. It’s just an existential despair thing, you know?

Thank you for your support over the years. I could not have done it without you.

If you want the long version, here you go. Continue reading Pivoting to Spiders

Recap: The 2018 City Manager’s Address

Photo from @imfgtoronto.

“The iceberg is gone, global warming has taken care of that,” jokes new City Manager Chris Murray as he begins his speech.

The iceberg, a municipal budget infographic portraying the City of Toronto’s billions of dollars in approved but unfunded capital projects, had become a cult favourite among City Hall wonks—you know, the kind of people who have cult favourite municipal budget infographics. These are the kind of people who go to the IMFG‘s annual City Manager’s Address, which took place at the end of November. (Slides available here.) Continue reading Recap: The 2018 City Manager’s Address

The Cheat Sheet: December 13, 2018 City Council

Once more unto the breach, dear friends. (Well, more like twice more, because my first draft was eaten by an unruly text editor.) This is more of a recap than a preview, as I only just recovered from an awful cold. Continue reading The Cheat Sheet: December 13, 2018 City Council