upon an encounter with a roadkill, my thought process: it would make a nice complete specimen (skin/skeleton); sensing a rotten smell, skin and tissue cannot be saved; I don’t have a salvage permit to begin with; it’s an invasive species so I may not need one; wait a second! I must go to work...

Definitely more peaceful to be alerted of sighting of bear than a wanted murder suspect near campus

“ATTN: Please be informed that a university staff has reported a bear sighting....On top of the tree on the north side of ...(see map). Number of bears sighted: 1, total length approximately 1 meter"

State of Open Data '24 with lots of data points visualized (e.g., Figs 4, 14) help understand how far Japan lags behind; staggering 56% responded they've never heard of the FAIR data principles before; new mandate by funding agencies may reverse the trend
digitalscience.figshare.com/articles/rep...

Fun checking out a tanabata festival - traditional ornamental bamboo decorations and colorful paper streamers hung from ceiling of shopping arcades in downtown Sendai. See the one in the center of Tohoku University’s artwork - wondering that’s a distorted, overly stretched, or metamorphosed Kenichi

A museum friend of mine at the Smithsonian shared this article on Kako Morita (森田華香), a Japanese scientific illustrator

"最後のアメリカ行きとなった 1930 年には、シアトルで入国拒否さ
れたことに対して憤りを表した記事が当時の朝日新聞(1930 年4月 19 日掲載)で紹介されている。その後の消息は、我々が調査した中ではわかっていない。...森田の人生について更なる調査が進む
ことを願っている。"

spo.nmfs.noaa.gov/sites/defaul...

As soon as I uploaded a mottled star found during my beachcombing at Alki yesterday, it's been added to a conservation study project: Tracking Starfish Wasting and Recovery to track the spread and recovery of starfish wasting along the west coast - interesting ⭐

www.inaturalist.org/projects/pis...

may the 4th be with you and happy children’s day in Japan - samurai armour piece, kabuto helmet on display

was meaningful to attend one of the May 1st #LawDay events together with other Seattle lawyers to commit to upholding the rule of law and making a difference in the community -- the judge particularly emphasized and we repeated “will abstain from all offensive personalities"

Was asked by a company with its headquarters in Japan to fill out this traditional carbon copy by hand including page total/ grand total at the bottom. Where's their favorite “DX” in their business practice and customer services to improve efficiency ... could create a spreadsheet online in minutes

my application dated 3/3 on the previous form version will be accepted - just learned from co-counsel for the American Immigration Lawyers Association case that since this litigation was filed on 3/7, USCIS has updated their website to include a grace period on forms

assets.aila.org/files/17525d...

fascinating talks by professors at law school on the theme of property law and AI with key topics such as doctrines of discovery and prior appropriation, 4th amendment search, first in time, data as property, AI patent dataset, Menominee forestry, public interest provisions, task economy, VC hypes..

so timely – signed and mailed one of USCIS application forms on 3/3, the day before USCIS announced a version update of that form with a retroactive date of 1/20 ("Edition Date: 01/20/25. As of March 4, 2025, the currently effective version is the 01/20/25 edition”); wondering mine would be rejected

asked for a deed of gift copy upon donation of a no-data specimen to a local collection, checking language covering both tangible and intangible -- “...hereby irrevocably assigns, transfers and conveys...all right, title and interest in and to the Property...throughout the world, and in perpetuity”

Philosophically provocative Qs in the Annual Survey of Museum-Goers re: disinformation and AI:
- What other sources of information do you find credible, and why? (-> nat hist colls)
- What concerns do you have about museums, trust, and credibility? (-> downstream data without material evidence)

A legal tech platform user group lunchtime session led by a data intelligence specialist - exciting to learn about latest features, workflow & best practices in prompt writing while it's scary to think about our own job security - as we will be replaced by generative AI in the not too distant future

Chatted a lot with collection people at a membership behind-the-scenes event at Burke; always fun catching up, talking about shared friends, compassion for federal collaborators, learning about interesting projects and discoveries, seeing next-generation scientists

I agree to a comment raised in a Japanese museum collections community S-net symposium re: digitization: issues with undiscoverable taxonomic / type information for Japanese species, inaccurate names used by data aggregators due to the current taxonomic backbone built only based on Western knowledge

The latest communication from the ICOM implies the draft-stage revised code of ethics under its collections & research core principle is likely addressing concepts like restitution, repatriation, collaborative research process, challenges for digital collections, exhaustive provenance research, etc.

Thank you Delta for reminding me of this flight 21 years ago. If the mileage was confirmed post travel, it must have been my one-way Northwest Airlines ticket to NY to start my new job by the Central Park.