the inflorescence of a jack-in-the-pulpit seen from the side. this unusual structure consists of a leaf-like sheath (the spathe) which wraps around and folds over the top of a flower-bearing column (the spadix). the spathe forms a tube less than two fingers in diameter and half a handspan in height; at the top in the front it curls down forming a collar, but in the back it becomes a long flap that curves up and over, drooping down on front side. the outside of the spathe is light green striped with white. on the inside, it is purple striped with white. the rounded top of the spadix is visible between the collar and hood of the spathe.

looking within the spathe to see the spadix within. the inner surface of the spathe is striped with purple and white. the spadix is a column, rounded (and blurry...) at the top. its upper portion is purple, but near its base it narrows and is white. the white section is lined with knobby purple and white flowers with neither calyx nor corolla.

a jack-in-the-pulpit standing in front of a big, mossy tree trunk, standing nearly knee-high above the leaf little on the forest floor. its reddish stem is pretty thick at the base. two leaves branch off the base in opposite directs, each around 45° off the main stem. the leaves' stems and the main stem are still somewhat stout even above the split. the green leaves are trifoliate with large ovate leaflets, one middle leaflet and two perpendicular lateral leaflets forming a T. the main stem terminates in an inflorescence with a green, white, and purple striped spathe wrapped around and folding loosely over the top of a cylindrical purple spadix. the flowers are tiny and hidden at the base of the spadix within the spathe.

🏵️ jack-in-the-pulpit 🌿
Arisaema triphyllum

#nativeplants #ecoregion71

Succulent skirt design

A little extra green for your spring wardrobe 🌿
Our Succulents skirt is still in stock.
Stretchy circle skirt with soft movement and pockets that actually fit your essentials.
store.mayakern.com

#store

Going to have to mix and match this time: carefully & off-kilter.

How do you move through the world?

1. carefully & quietly
2. loudly & brashly
3. off-kilter & careening
4. foggy & formless

Will suggest this to my spouse for the next time they use flax egg for cookies! 😆

I just ended my subscription with a local McClatchy paper, and when the customer service rep asked why, the use of "A.i" was one of the reasons I shared. I valued the local journalists, but there was too much else wrong with McClatchy—so glad to see some journalists pushing back on this issue.

Seanan McGuire's Sleep No More - an October Daye novel

The Wayward Children series by Seanan McGuire

Congratulations @seananmcguire.bsky.social for being the first author to be on the Hugo Shortlist in a prose category (novel, novelette, short story, novella, or series) every year for a full decade.

The Hugo Ballot has had at least one work by Seanan every year since 2017.

"move fast and break things" isn't something that most people want, they want their programs to be stable and unbroken

Across five prose fiction categories, there are 30 different authors shortlisted.

That means no author was shortlisted more than once for a novel, short story, novelette, novella, or series.

Awesome to note there are 10 authors who appear on the ballot in those five categories for the first time.

I get way more photos of their screens than actual screenshots. I've tried providing directions for how to do screenshots, but it doesn't help. I'm at the point of, "Well, as long as I can see what they're trying to share, it'll do." 🤷

"They went door-to-door to tell their neighbors what the city had not told them: The data center would use twice as much electricity as all of Monterey Park."

The city’s notification in English reached only 40 people living within 500 feet. Activists worked in English, Chinese, Spanish & more!

A single very brainy morel mushroom pushes away a dried oak leaf to rise into the early spring air. All photos by me

Here is a nice mushroom

EU’s top court finds Hungary’s anti-LGBTQ+ law in breach of key values ECJ says law passed in 2021 is discriminatory and ‘contrary to the identity of the union’, in early test for new PM

“The EU’s highest court has found Hungary’s anti-LGBTQ+ law to be discriminatory, stigmatising and in breach of basic democratic values…”

This is a crucial decision. The court rejected the political claim that LGBTQ+ representation is “propaganda.” We must keep fighting politics that dehumanise us.

I said "holy crap" aloud in my empty office

This parent did the right thing, but because other parents did not, her daughter is dead. Vaccinate your kids, people.

The Public Scholar publishes one week from today. Please consider pre-ordering and/or asking your library to order. Authors really need your pre-orders to make a book go.

I think it's a useful book! More importantly, so do real scholars and writers!

www.press.jhu.edu/books/title/...

Talking Trans History with a Trans Legend — Assigned A conversation between Assigned Media and trans historian Susan Stryker.

@rikiwilchins.bsky.social 2026 Apr
I interview historian/sage Susan Stryker for Assigned Media after publication of the third edition of her landmark book, "Transgender History: A Resource for Today's Struggle—and Tomorrow"

www.assignedmedia.org/breaking-new...

🧵

Not @mestefan.bsky.social point, but I'm coming to hate the phrase "data driven".

National Library Workers Day: Libraries Work Because We Do. April 21, 2026. ALA-APA logo

It's National Library Workers Day, our favorite day of #NationalLibraryWeek where we celebrate the hardworking, dedicated professionals who power possibility in our neighborhoods, our schools, and our places of higher learning.

Thank you, library workers - libraries work because YOU do! #NLWD26

Have you been taught that “fluency” is a dirty word, and not the goal of teaching math?

DM me or comment here. #iTeachMath

How unique are hallucinated citations offered by generative Artificial Intelligence models? This paper investigates how generative AI produces and propagates hallucinated academic references, focusing on the recurring non-existent citation 'Education Governance and Datafication' attributed t...

How unique are hallucinated citations offered by generative Artificial Intelligence models? This is greatly useful by Dirk Spenneman on "the structure, recurrence, and onward citation" of "phantom references", using a paper I didn't write as an extended example arxiv.org/abs/2604.16407

🗃️ Funny how it's ALWAYS an older, white, male professor, who stems an op-ed that "actually everyone that came into this discipline after me is doing it wrong and they are the problem. Not me!"

There are so many leaps in this piece that it's hard to wrap my head around, but I'll try a few:

1/

Comic book panel showing a balding man sitting in an aisle seat on an airplane, looking down at his hands in despair. There's a woman with a pillow in her lap in the window seat, but only part of her can be seen. HIS WORD BALLOON #1: "I never finished writing my novel ... " HIS WORD BALLOON #2: "I never even started writing it." [from Ice Cream Man #25, August 2021, written by W. Maxwell Prince, art by Martin Morazzo, colors by Chris O'Halloran.]

Your context-free comic book panel of the day.

'SWIMS' upside down is still 'SWIMS.'

Obergefell. You can now access the entire record of the Supreme Court's case along with many others from the 1800s until 2019 via the Internet Archive.

154 viewable files with text that can be highlighted, copied, and pasted into new documents.

"Setting and enforcing boundaries is self care."
Somebody (me) needed it repeated. ❤️

And same, Lurking Horror, same.

If you have ever seen/heard/read speculation that Miranda Priestly (Devil Wears Prada) is autistic or neurodivergent, please comment, DM, and send links for an upcoming piece I’m working on! 👠 #ActuallyAutistic #DevilWearsPrada #DevilWearsPrada2

"Extending these deadlines denies timely access to essential government services and information, forcing people with disabilities to wait even longer for rights that should already be guaranteed."

I see Simon woke up this morning and chose violence.

alt-text is primarily for people with vision impairments, but *not just* for them.