The Red Sox May Finally Have a Second Baseman
Examining How We Measure Our Lives
Commentary, critiques, and observations on information design and data visualisation
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Read on…: The Red Sox May Finally Have a Second Baseman
Last week was baseball’s opening day. And so on the socials I released my predictions for the season and then a look at the revolving door that has been the Red Sox and second base since 2017. Back in 2017 we were in the 11th year of Dustin Pedroia being the Sox’ star second baseman. That summer, Manny Machado slid…
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My Irish Heritage
Read on…: My Irish HeritageThis week began with Saint Patrick’s Day, a day that here in the States celebrates Ireland and Irish heritage. And I have an abundance of that. As we saw in a post earlier this year about some new genetic ancestry results, Ireland accounts for approximately 2/3 of my ancestry. But as many of my readers know, actual records-based genealogy is…
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113 Years Later and We’re Still Talking About Watertight Compartments
Read on…: 113 Years Later and We’re Still Talking About Watertight CompartmentsEarlier this week, a Portuguese-flagged cargo container ship collided with an American-flagged tanker just off the Humber estuary in Yorkshire, England. The American-flagged ship, the Stena Immaculate, carries aviation fuel for the US Air Force. The Solong, the Portuguese-flagged tanker, carries alcohol, which is far better than the toxic chemicals initially feared. We still know very little about the circumstances…
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A Refreshed Look at My Ethnic Heritage
Read on…: A Refreshed Look at My Ethnic HeritageLate last week I received an update on my ethnic breakdown from My Heritage, a competitor of Ancestry.com and other genealogy/family history/genetic ancestry companies. For many years, the genealogical community had been waiting for this long-promised update. And it has finally arrived. For my money, My Heritage’s older analysis, v0.95, did not align with my historical record research—something I have…
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Imports, Tariffs, and Taxes, Oh My!
Read on…: Imports, Tariffs, and Taxes, Oh My!Apologies, all, for the lengthy delay in posting. I decided to take some time away from work-related things for a few months around the holidays and try to enjoy, well, the holidays. Moving forward, I intend to at least start posting about once per week. After all, the state of information design these days provides me a lot of potential…
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Predicting…the Known Stats?
Read on…: Predicting…the Known Stats?I have been trying to post more regularly here on Coffeespoons, but now that baseball’s postseason is in full swing—pun fully intended—my free time is spent watching balls and strikes at all hours of the day. (Though, with the Wild Card round over and the move from four to two games per day, my time will likely expand as the…
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Racing to the Final Finish Line
Read on…: Racing to the Final Finish LineThoroughbred racing is big business. And Philadelphia’s Parx Casino owns a racing track that, in a recent article in the Philadelphia Inquirer, has seen a number of horse deaths. The article includes a single graphic worth noting, a bar chart showing the thoroughbred death rate. The graphic contrasts rising deaths at Parx with a national trend of declining deaths. Traditionally…
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Titan’s Final Words
Read on…: Titan’s Final WordsLast week wrapped up the Coast Guard’s two-week inquiry into the sinking of the submersible Titan, which imploded on a dive to the wreck of Titanic. The BBC summarised the findings in an article at the weekend. It included a number of fascinating annotated photographs identifying parts of the wreckage. But it also included the following graphic, which captures the…
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Tired of These Motherf*cking Sox on This Motherf*cking Plane
Read on…: Tired of These Motherf*cking Sox on This Motherf*cking PlaneAt least, that’s what I imagine South Siders saying in Chicago as they watch the White Sox team charter plane land at Midway. For those not following America’s Major League Baseball season, the Chicago White Sox are one of two clubs claiming Chicago as their home. (The other being the Cubs.) And the White Sox—not to be confused with your…
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I Need My Sharpie. Where’s My Sharpie?
Read on…: I Need My Sharpie. Where’s My Sharpie?Because who does not recall the great Sharpie forecast track by the National Hurricane Center (NHC)? Earlier this summer, in the middle of the hurricane season, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s (NOAA’s) NHC released a new, experimental warning cone map. For those unfamiliar, these are the maps that have a white and white-shaded forecast for where the centre of…