In Richardson ISD's June 18th runoff election for its District 2 seat on the Board of Trustees, I'll be voting for Vanessa Pacheco. I won't be voting for Sherry Clemens because of dealbreakers like this: she promotes extreme propaganda like "The Mind Polluters."
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Source: Precinct Saying.
In college, I read Thomas Kuhn's "The Structure of Scientific Revolutions." In it he popularized the term "paradigm shift" for insights that forever change the framework in which we view the world.
An example is Copernicus's upending of the Ptolemaic cosmology with a helio-centric model. Just think: before Copernicus, the term "solar system" didn't even exist. Now it's second nature to all of us. Another example is Einstein's upending of Newtonian gravity with general relativity. Just think: before Einstein, the word spacetime didn't even exist. Now it's...well, still not second nature. Relativity is still impossible to wrap our minds around, even a century after Einstein, but it has fundamentally changed science.
Thomas Kuhn's work had a big impact on my formative thinking. That's maybe too portentous an introduction for what I'm about to say I learned today, but I'll say it anyway. In all the commentary on Uvalde, one comment (actually a Tweetstorm) has the potential of causing a paradigm shift in my worldview of law enforcement and public safety.
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The City of Richardson is beginning a project to build a 5 million gallon ground storage tank. Where? Well, I can tell you nearby streets. I can even tell you approximate GPS coordinates. What I can't tell you is whether or not the tank is going to be in Point North Park. What I can tell you is that a city-owned playground will have to go. So will trees. Maybe they'll be moved. Maybe new trees will be planted. And after all is said and done, some of the land that many visitors to the park always considered to be part of the park will be sacrificed to a water storage tank.
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| From 2019 11 22 Valley of the Kings |
Today's photo-of-the-day is from the Colossi of Memnon across the Nile River from Luxor, Egypt. According to Wikipedia, "The Colossi of Memnon are two massive stone statues of the Pharaoh Amenhotep III, which stand at the front of the ruined Mortuary Temple of Amenhotep III, the largest temple in the Theban Necropolis. They have stood since 1350 BCE, and were well known to ancient Greeks and Romans, as well as early modern travelers and Egyptologists."
Where does Memnon come into this? Memnon was a mythological Greek king. Blame the ancient Greeks for not knowing about even more ancient Egyptian history.
I didn’t have a religion, and I didn’t do team sports, and for a long time orchestra had been the only place where I felt like part of something bigger than I was, where I was able to strive and at the same time to forget myself. The loss of that feeling was extremely painful. It would have been bad enough to be someplace where there were no orchestras, but it was even worse to know that there was one, and lots of people were in it—just not me. I dreamed about it almost every night."
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Elif Batuman's debut novel is a first person account of her freshman year in college, followed by a summer teaching English in Hungary. She has a keen eye for detail. She shows wry humor throughout. You learn about love and linguistics along the way.
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#VeryTardyReview
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On May 17, 2022, The City of Richardson's City Plan Commission (CPC) recommended approval of an application for development of a 5-story apartment building with up to 171 units to accommodate 529 beds on the north side of UT-Dallas at Richardson. It's been a long, hard road to get (back) to this point. The application now moves to City Council, where it has to be considered an underdog for getting approval there, too.
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#VeryTardyReview
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The Richardson school district (RISD) is seeking a new superintendent. Everybody has an opinion. Expectations and demands are as high as those set by the George Banks family in Edwardian England when advertising for a nanny.
"If you want this choice position, have a cheery disposition.
Rosy cheeks, no warts. Play games, all sorts.
You must be kind, you must be witty, very sweet, and fairly pretty.
Take us on outings, give us treats, sing songs, bring sweets.
Never be cross or cruel. Never give us castor oil or gruel.
Love us as a son and daughter, and never smell of barley water.
Hurry, Nanny! Many thanks!
Sincerely,
Jane and Michael Banks!"
Assuming that someone with the qualifications of Mary Poppins isn't
available, what criteria should be used to identify the RISD's next
superintendent?
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Where Am I Wednesday?
Fifty points to the first person to identify where this photo was taken.
Answer is after the jump.
Richardson, Texas, is not Egypt. Everything here has to be so difficult. The property in question here is zoned retail and has been for decades. The property to the immediate north is, too, but is undeveloped. The property to the south across the street is zoned retail and unified residential. So zoning is not the problem. The plan is for a restaurant, not a bar or lounge. It's not just another hookah lounge in a neighborhood of hookah lounges. It's family friendly. It offers a mix of services — food, entertainment, alcohol, hookah. It's a unique concept for Richardson. Maher Maho of Frisco, mayor of that city from 2008-2017, came to Richardson to speak before the City Council to support the request. I can't remember that happening before.
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Needed to watch this before "Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness" was released. #VeryTardyReview
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Where Am I Wednesday?
Fifty points to the first person to locate this photo.
Answer after the jump.
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| From: Anna Donlan |
"The Partisans Are Coming for Your Cities and Schools." That was the headline of a Texas Monthly article as far back as five years ago. The Wheel wrote about the encroachment of partisan party politics several times (e.g., in November, 2020: "Partisan Nonpartisan Elections"). I do not like it when the Republicans do it. I do not like it when the Democrats do it. I do not like it.
I DO NOT LIKE THEM HERE OR THERE.
I DO NOT LIKE THEM ANYWHERE.
I DO NOT LIKE GREEN EGGS AND HAM.
I DO NOT LIKE THEM, SAM-I-AM.
Source: Alliance for Children.
During the public comment section of the April 11, 2022, Richardson ISD school board meeting, one speaker criticized RISD for practicing child "grooming" in elementary schools as part of official RISD policy. Yeah. Then it got worse.
In case you still wonder, CRT is not a subject taught in public schools in Richardson ISD, nor anywhere else in Texas. It's against state law to teach CRT in Texas public schools. Where does the myth that it's in RISD come from and why is it so hard to put down? In part, it's because partisans wanting to take over school boards know that people have bad connotations for the words "critical," "race," and "theory." Put them together and people think surely CRT must be something really bad, even if people can't say exactly what it is. If critics actually define the term CRT, they fall back on making up their own definition. And their own definition is something even libtards agree is bad. It's a straw man that the critics erect because it's easy to argue against. But it's not being taught, no matter how many times the critics cry "CRT, CRT, CRT."
After the jump, more random thoughts.
