First, a warm welcome back to the talented Rylee Skye who has returned, continuing with Dear Ariel.

If you’re not familiar with the stories, I can’t recommend them highly enough. Rylee has a rare talent for covering what could easily be sordid and disturbing, with taste and grace. The story is intimate in scope, heartbreaking in circumstances, but uplifting in the characters’ growth beyond them. Its people are so profoundly human and so clearly drawn. The writing and editing are flawless.

[Some say mine’s not organized at all, but that’s beside the point.]

Stanford says they have a model that classifies brain scans into male or female.

https://med.stanford.edu/news/all-news/2024/02/men-women-bra...

I think the idea has shown up in stories, and here we now have something more specific.

Light approaches subject,
Shadow grows until it consumes all.
A loved one’s battle with Alzheimer’s has ended.

Quoted in a mainstream publication! Washington Post story on Rat Girl Summer:

https://wapo.st/44ckBp7

This link should not hit a paywall; I pay WaPo for the privilege to send a few of these, so please PM me if it doesn’t work.

Modern gender role assumptions may have wrongly colored conclusions about the past:

https://www.livescience.com/archaeology/men-hunt-and-women-g...

Author of Luna, perhaps the first mainstream-publisher young-adult novel with a trans character.

While this paper has a mixed record on trans issues, the publication of this is at least hopeful.

In a week we’ve gone from 70 degrees (21 C) to major freezing-rain damage and back. Roof remained watertight though the live oaks took a severe natural pruning; not their first and still likely long to outlive me. I must have imagined the cold dark house, since the governor swears on his Lone Star that our energy system is robust, but that’s back too.

I love discoveries in bookstores. What are favorites, perhaps not in your own town but a worthy destination?

One of mine is Malaprop’s, Asheville, North Carolina; forever grateful to the friends who insisted on a stop there during a trip.

Also, does it have a cat, at least as of your last visit? Malaprop’s: yes.

Hope this is not too political or inflammatory. I trust the mods to remove it if so.

There is definite abuse of trans kids here (not by the parents). Enough said.

https://www.kvue.com/article/news/local/texas/transgender-st...

Interesting. https://www.sciencenews.org/article/female-animal-myths-lucy...

Interesting exhibit of that title on spirituality, body image, and multiple/non-binary gender, at the Asian Art Museum in San Francisco through Jul 29. Might offer some inspiration.

Amazon sells pretty much everything, including toilets, which ship free. So even when buying building supplies, please do as I did and use the BC link so the crew who keep this place running will get their commission.

Nonfiction but rather well written IMO:

https://www.washingtonpost.com/national/a-small-town-doctor-...