@Olivia_Rodrigo's "drivers license" is all in 4/4, but uses some VERY creative phrasing to create a sense of suspense! cc @SwitchedOnPop @Top40Theory @TheDanielNigro

each verse is 7 bars long, with 6 lines and one bar of rest. Your ears expect 8, but you get an odd number. (1/5)

Rodrigo sings the last line, "Crying 'cause you weren't around," then her voice drops out, leaving you in the emptiness of the music...

But then, a piano chord pitchshifts down as the next section starts up a bar early, as if she's interrupted by her own thoughts. (2/5)

similarly, each chorus is 10(!) bars long. The first four lines are two pairs of 3 bars, which is pretty uncommon...

But just as you get used to it, the last two lines have twice as many syllables - and cut off the chorus unresolved in only 2 bars! (3/5)

The bridge is more conventional, with two sets of 8 bars. It's the only part of the song that feels familiar and predictable. Olivia's going nowhere, stuck in her past memories. (4/5)

In the final chorus, she repeats the last line, resolving the song with 3 sets of 4 bars.

It's neater, but it's still not symmetrical. Where any other song would give you a chorus of 16, "drivers license" doesn't give you the satisfaction. Brilliant pop songwriting. (5/5)

🧵on the Toronto area SGTF (S-Gene Target Failure) study to detect B117 (UK variant). It looked at 11,485 positive tests over Dec 16 to Feb 3 and found 448 had SGTF* (3.9%). These charts show the growth.
https://t.co/5L8tF0MwDv

2. Note: Not every SGTF is B117 but almost all were confirmed with WGS (whole genomic sequencing). Rt for the SGTF was 1.17, non-SGTF were .82 meaning SGTF had an Rt 44% higher. This means that B117 is growing quickly (80% per week in recent weeks) and is projected to overtake

3. the old variants around Feb 20th in the Toronto area. Because the Rt (reproduction number) was only .82 without B117, we know the lockdown was working well in Toronto. It's only because the variant was a small share that infections and cases fell. If it had reached 100%,

4. then every infection would have infected 1.17 more infections and we would have had exponential growth EVEN IN LOCKDOWN where we have seen cases plummet.

5. This data is for the Toronto area. The projections have uncertainty - Feb 20 is approximate but once B117 becomes increasingly dominant over the next 6 weeks, current lockdown efforts would be hard-pressed to stop R from moving above 1, meaning an exponential growth in cases.

I have worked all day on the Holiday Inn Cluster timeline

The first case was reported late on Feb 7
This was the Authorised Officer who tested negative after a shift on Feb 4, returned to work on the 7th, developed symptoms and tested positive

A cohort of her colleagues were then required to test and quarantine

The next case to emerge was a guest at the hotel who left HQ on Dec 7 after completing their 14 days

They were tested as a result of the AO testing positive

That result came back on the 9th

On the 9th it was also determined that the viral genome sequence for the AO case was identical to a family of 3 who had been at the Holiday Inn

All had B.1.1.7 VOC

That family was transferred to a hot hotel on Feb 4

Feb 3 and 4 are now believed to be the exposure dates relevant to the beginning of the cluster

The father in the family of 3 was admitted to ICU on the 9th

As of Feb 14 there are 16 cases linked back to the Holiday Inn but there is a sub cluster linked to a Private Dining event in Coburg on Feb 6 for 5 of those cases

The intersection point is a hotel quarantine worker and it is a little confusing as the TLs overlap

Men are only allies/support women survivors when it doesn't make them have to reflect on the friends they keep or become self reflective of how they treat women.
A thread :

Im a sexual assault survivor and yes I am triggered every time another man is trending on a social media platform because of abusing women.
You know why? Because I see how quiet men get when this shit goes down when its "too close to home" and I just fuckin lose it.

In the 90's. I rented a room in an apartment from friend of a friend. it was a female friend recommending this guy, I felt safe.
But I wasnt. After a house party when i went to my room to sleep, my roommate and 2 of his friends came into my room and sexual assaulted me.

It was the most scariest shit I've lived through, and I've live thru some shit. I called the cops, I filed charges.1 of my best friends since I was 16 was at that party. When I told him what happened he said he wasn't surprised b/c my roommate bragged about doing things to women.

When I asked him to testify in court for me, he said he couldn't get the time off work... whats even more troubling is that he could have warned me. Got me out of there that night because of what knew. But I guess it's bros code, ya know?

[1/x] Happy to announce the publication of “RETROFIT DECARBONIZATION of COAL POWER” (open access https://t.co/JxrMtLS9gf, @energies_mdpi). A riveting 39-page article (+ 44p S.I.), obviously makes for excellent holiday/wknd reading :) Here's an attempt at a tweet-summary-thread!

[2/x] Out of ~2 TWe of coal power plant capacity, more than half is less than 14 years old. Can this infrastructure play a role in decarbonized power systems or must it all be stranded? We try to look at ALL options in this work, supported by @EnvDefenseEuro & Rodel Foundation.

[3/x] Capacity-averaged age of all coal power in operation today is ~18 years. Committed emissions from existing and under-construction coal power is ~300 GTCO2-eq (294 is our central estimate, IEA say ~328). Each new 1 GW-plant commits to ~0.2 GT additionally.

[4/x] We define the term RETROFIT DECARBONIZATION to include _anything_ done to keep existing some coal plant equipment in operation (>5 % of org. plant capex), approx. maintaining its function (>50 % of org. annual generation) while eliminating emissions (<50 gCO2-eq/kWh).

[5/x] Many retrofit options were assessed (some shown here). Emissions reqs. put tough pressure on biomass & CCS. Putting wind & solar at former coal sites is a great idea, but power dens. diff. mean they don't qualify as retrofit decarb. What really works? Geothermal & Nuclear!

Unite the Union’s Executive Council meets tomorrow to receive a report on the union’s hugely over-budget Birmingham Conference Centre and Hotel Project. Here are ten questions that should be asked and answered:

1. What is the full cost up to the present date of Unite the Union’s Birmingham Conference Centre and Hotel project?

2. What will be the total and final cost of Unite the Union’s Birmingham Conference Centre and Hotel project when it is completed?

3. Who prepared the budget for the Unite’s Bham building project; what was the planned cost, timetable and completion date, how and when was this agreed by the union?

4. Who has approved subsequent increases in costs for Unite’s Bham building project, and how and when were these cost increases reported to the union’s Executive?

I've gotten questions about whether to emphasize U-6 as the "true unemployment rate". It is currently 11.1%.

I don't because I think the concept doesn't add much, it misses how unusually bad the labor market is now, is analytically flawed, and can be misleading.

Thread:

The official unemployment rate is 6.3%. It is unemployed (people looking for work) divided by the labor force (working or looking for work).

U-6 is 11.1%, it adds in "marginally attached" (discouraged workers & would take a job if it came along) and involuntary part-time.

DOESN'T ADD MUCH. U-6 is one of several alternative unemployment concepts produced monthly by the BLS. They are all useful to look at. But they also all pretty much up and down together so they rarely tell much of a different story.

MISSES HOW UNUSUALLY BAD THE LABOR MARKET IS NOW. The last time U-6 was around 11.1% the unemployment rate was 5.7%. If anything based on historic relationships U-6 makes the labor market seem bad (like in 2015) but not terrible (like in 2012).

The reason is that a large part of U-6 is part time for economic reasons (aka involuntary part time). This is up but actually not up an unusually large amount given the increase in unemployment. We've seen a lot of jobs lost but people with jobs, on average, working longer.

0/ When large eng orgs rely on metrics for both monitoring *and* observability, they struggle with cardinality.

This is a thread about “the two drivers of cardinality.” And which one of those we should kill. :)

🧵👇

1/ Okay, first off: “what is cardinality, anyway?” And why is it such a big deal for metrics?

“Cardinality” is a mathematical term: it’s *the number of elements in a set*... boring! So why tf does anybody care??

Well, because people think they need it, then suddenly, "$$$$$$$."

2/ When a developer inserts a (custom) metric to their code, they might think they’re just adding, well, *one metric*. …

3/ … But when they add “tags” to that metric – like , , or (shiver) – they are actually creating a *set* of metric time series, with the *cardinality* of that set being the total number of unique combinations of those tags.

4/ The problem is that some of those tags have many distinct values.

E.g., when I was working on Monarch at Google, there was a single gmail metric that became over 300,000,000 (!!!) distinct time series. In a TSDB, that cardinality is the unit of cost.

So again, “$$$$$$$.”

The new pooled testing initiation for MA schools is a game changer. Looking forward to seeing how this is going to roll out. Initial plans seem to call for pooled PCR testing for classes, followed by rapid antigen testing for pools that are positive. 1/

This is NOT exactly what colleges are doing. MA colleges are screening with individual testing, not pooled testing. BTW, this has been very successful. It's not just screening, it's also going all in on tracing, isolation, distancing, masks, education. 2/

But no question that infection rates are much lower than the general population. Check out this graph from Dec 19. Percent positivity is much lower in higher ed.

I don't think this is because college students stay at home all day and never have risky social interactions! 3/

But there are a LOT more K-12 students than college students. So use of pooled PCR tests is crucial to keep costs down. Also intrigued by the proposed use of rapid antigen tests to find the infectious member of a positive pool. 4/ @michaelmina_lab

One of the lessons from higher ed is that regular PCR testing is really the best test to detect asymptomatic infection, which will be even more common in K-12 than college-aged students. 5/ @mbebinger @RanuDhillon

When we look back at the past we see eras associated with family, household, respectfulness, faith and order and we know them as "traditional" eras. These eras are also unequivocally associated with male domination and power.

When we look back we identify eras that we've naturally associated with a break with this that happens every so often and tends to invert what's associated with traditional eras. Including who has power.

This is no accident.

Indeed, be it that it is one group or multiple sharing power the fact remains that the traditional power holders are characteristically (in these eras) powerless and those who hold power are always the same.

The first anarchist, Proundhon, wrote about what happens when women have power and called it "Pornocracy". He argued that men should do everything in their remaining power to prevent this including using their natural superior physical strength.

He had argued for using everything to usurp a society and establish proper order. Nothing was off the table.
He argued to same towards women for the same reasons.
The debilitating sort of power both possess and the cruelty with which they use it.

Who are all the hypocrites who voted against abolishing the Tampon Tax back in 2015 but have had a sudden change of heart? First up, Steve Baker, Conservative MP for Wycombe.

Next we have Bernard Jenkin, Conservative MP for Harwich and North Essex. The patronising way in which he calls Stella Creasy "feisty" really shows his commitment against sexism. Nice job!

Rishi Sunak, the Chancellor and Conservative MP for Richmond, Yorkshire, also voted against the 2015 motion to abolish the Tampon tax. What's with the autographed graphics, Rishi? Do you think you're some kind of rock star?

Harriet Baldwin, Conservative MP for West Worcestershire has posted the lie that it was EU membership which prevented us ditching the Tampon tax. Harriet, you voted against the 2015 motion to abolish this tax. Have you forgotten?

James Cartlidge, Conservative MP for South Suffolk didn't post his own tweet. But he did retweet Rishi Sunak. James, how soon you forgot your vote in 2015 against abolishing the Tampon tax!

@danielpunkass Fair warning, this might get long:

The most obvious aspect is that the time drawn out supposedly "teaching" was really not worth it in proportion to the simplicity of the task.

The first thing I noticed reading that thread was that she was already hungry at the beginning.

That would have been my first clue to go, okay, hm, maybe another time. You could always demonstrate the use of the can opener (observation is one really great way to learn, after all!) for the child, and then get into the mechanics once tummies were filled.

Let's say we missed that chance, though, and were deep into the question-and-answer session. At that point there's a good chance I would think 'Well, there's no going back now' and let my stubbornness see this through, as OP did in his thread.

But that's very much based on *my* reactions and urges as an adult, not what is best for the child. This might be a cultural difference, but in New Zealand (where I live) we try to put the child first.

The OP's daughter clearly communicated her needs (and her frustration) -

sighs, asking politely, rolling her eyes, removing herself from the situation to avoid esclation... When those were ignored, she had to resort to yelling and tears (fair enough, if you ask me!). It really sucks that the adult in the situation decided to steamroll ahead,

1/ End of year thread: in December 2019 I found out I was selected to be a 2020-2021 Public Scholar @Concordia. Though My tenure wouldn't start until May (when I started this Mega thread). I decided to start sharing more of my research in January 2020.

“Hey DDD, men will sleep with anything? Right?🐷” Oh boy! That’s a view I’ve heard many times before. Like a lot of folk psychology, there’s a tiny kernel of truth🌽here that's blown way out of proportion. And I think I know what it is… [1/17]

First of all: There's a full spectrum of mating pickiness both sexes. Men so picky they never lose their virginity and women with unusually low standards. There’s a lot of noise and variation. Thus, we should be sceptical about neat black and white🐧claims about the sexes. [2/17]

That being said, there are often patterns to be found in the noise. Enough to draw some conclusions about the *typical* mating behaviour of each sex, but not enough to predict the behaviour of individuals with a high degree of accuracy. [3/17]

One of those patterns appears to be that more men than women “lower their standards” when it comes to sex. But, and here’s the important part, it’s in a particular context: short-term mating. [4/17]

Humans, by and large are pair-bonded mammals. From megacities to small bands of hunter gatherers, humans seek a special partner to fall in love💕and share their life with. And as far as we know, this has been the case thousands (perhaps millions) of years. [5/17]

Somerset Loves Europe
#EveningwithSeanDromgoole
Starting at 8 live tweets:

Sean Dromgoole is Chair of CLP Somerton and Frome
Sean joins as Talk of West Country Bylines commending article about David Warburton

Introductions by Matt Geen
Sean pleased to become acquainted with pro EU group.
Somerset born and bred

Love affair with France began at age 6-7 on a family holiday and broken down Rover in a small village: amazing food + great play mates. School exchanges rendered Europe ordinary.

Then making a film -with Anthony Hopkins in France. Sean became the go-between both languages. France became a place where he could earn a living.

I’ve been thinking a bit about being openly or obviously ‘other’.

My life experiences have been fairly unusual, & while I do enjoy communicating about this, it can also be quite othering being perpetually the odd-one-out in a group who folks ask to explain stuff.

THREAD

And while it’s well-intentioned, and I think it’s important that folks actually listen to autistic/trans/POC/etc people when it comes to understanding our experiences, it can also be a lot of pressure when I’m the only autistic nb non-white person in a group of cis white folks

And over time even when folks listen and are respectful, I feel that self conscious, and also worried that they are placing me on a sort of ‘pedestal of otherness’ that actually can stop them from truly empathising and understanding.

To start to understand folks who are different, it’s important to both acknowledge how different experiences can be(esp if yours are more ‘typical’), but also acknowledge that they are not SO different that you should not try to challenge yourself to try and understand better

We should not be stopping at “I can’t possibly understand what it’s like to be you” but instead always be trying, even with the knowledge that it might be difficult. This is the perhaps the kind of labour that NTs, cis, white, and other dominant groups owe marginalised identities