It's almost time for the 2022 ToB!

It's almost time for the 2022 Tournament of Books, presented by Field Notes. Check out the short list today!

The Morning News
Some thoughts on what early bikes did for women. "Almost everyone one knows is buying a bicycle or talking of buying one."
↩︎ Flashbak 2d
You can get a bicycle and $10,000 in Bitcoin if you work remotely and you're willing to move to northwest Arkansas.
↩︎ Axios 2d

Kitties vs. Café

A diorama-themed restaurant in Osaka was saved from pandemic-closure after a family of cats made it their home. As related by Spoon & Tamago:

It was like the set of a monster cat movie so the owner began photographing and posting pictures to the restaurant’s Instagram account. Before long, people began showing up from all over Japan to see the cats and business took off.

From the Instagram account:

2d
Your weekly white paper: A new study finds both men and women look better with a mask, preferably blue, obscuring their face.
↩︎ The Guardian 2d

It’s pointless to debate which group is loneliest. Still, I might argue for some sympathy for Northerners in midlevel jobs who work alone or remotely.

Pouring one out for the academics, the accountants, the middle managers dealing with pandemic loneliness.
↩︎ Bloomberg
2d
People are swabbing their throats with at-home Covid tests, looking for more accurate results. "They may stab themselves."
↩︎ NPR 2d

What it might look like if you asked a neural network to show you something relaxing.

2d
Continuing a downward slide, college enrollment has dropped by more than a million students since the start of the pandemic.
↩︎ NPR 3d
Upload and glitch any image.
↩︎ Glitch Image Generator 3d
The RNC may require presidential candidates to refuse to be in debates sponsored by the Commission on Presidential Debates.
↩︎ The New York Times 3d
The TMN Store is another way you can support The Morning News and the Tournament of Books. (Plus, Sustaining Members get 50% off.)
↩︎ TMN Member Store 3d
"In theory...electoral democracy allows citizens to select authentic representatives." On replacing elections with lotteries.
↩︎ Vox 3d
The Smithsonian is collecting artifacts from the Jan. 6 insurrection.
↩︎ Hyperallergic 3d

Some people don’t visit their doctors because of cost or time scarcity. Deliberate ignorance is choosing not to go as an emotional regulation strategy: to avoid having to feel the negative emotions that might arise—even if it could prevent more serious consequences in the future.

From spoilers to avoiding doctors, researchers are studying deliberate ignorance.
↩︎ VICE
3d
"Working together to control the virus should have been the ultimate shared goal." Is America too polarized for common sacrifice?
↩︎ The New Yorker 4d
Nearly half of Kroger grocery workers say they borrowed money last year to afford basic needs. A third skipped meals.
↩︎ Buzzfeed News 4d
"Solo polyamory," recently popularized by Willow Smith, refers to somebody seeing themselves as their own primary partner.
↩︎ Screenshot 4d

A plankton bloom leads to a storm of crabs, leads to a horde of giant eagle rays, some of whom weigh over a ton and still manage to leap six feet out of the water.

Via TKSST

4d
The world's only museum of tiny wet wipes runs out of an office in Michigan's Abrams Planetarium.
↩︎ CBC Radio 4d
Due to supply chain woes, Norway asks conscripts to return their military-issued underwear so other soldiers can wear them.
↩︎ The Associated Press 4d