Hello there, reader, and welcome to another midweek issue of Kat’s Kable. As always, there are great things to read, and somehow the theme this issue has inadvertently become… oceans and seas! Four pieces are about seas and another two are about wondrous animals and creatures. Fun fun. I am beginning to feel the telltale signs of burnout at work, and honestly, things have been a lot and rather relentless. Well, whether or not the relenting comes, there’s always good things to read. So! Do read - and tell me how you liked it.

1. At 40, She Discovered She Was One of America’s Best Free Divers (Texas Monthly):

Well, doesn’t the title tell you all you need to know? Superb.

2. The Lessons of Uzbekistan’s Lost Sea (WaPo):

A story about a different sort of water and a different sort of water body: the Aral Sea, which is almost gone now - possibly one of the greatest manmade ecological disasters?

3. Puzzled (The American Scholar):

Fun meditation on jigsaw puzzles.

4. Oh f*ck, you’re still sad? (Bess Stillman):

Back in 2024, I shared one of the most heart-wrenching things I’ve read: No Salt about Jake Seliger’s last days. This post is by his wife Bess Stillman and her meditations on grief.

5. Is the Sagrada Família a Masterpiece or Kitsch? (NYT):

Loved this deep dive into the amazing cathedral that’s still being built in Barcelona. Legendary.

6. In Photos: A Solo Road Trip Along Oman’s Remote Coastline (Atmos):

More great photos (you have to click on the left/right arrows to navigate)!

7. Weird and wondrous sea cucumbers (Knowable Magazine):

Weird and wondrous indeed. I did not know that sea cucumbers are considered to be the “vacuum cleaners” of the oceans.

8. How to Dress and Undress your Home (Low Tech Magazine):

I usually really love Low-Tech Magazine’s work, but this one somehow didn’t cut it. Make no mistake, it’s still a good piece and worth reading, but not as enjoyable to me as the others. It’s about the use of textiles for passive cooling and heating of our homes.

9. We Can, Must, and Will Simulate Nematode Brains (Asterisk Mag):

Funnily enough, I read this piece because it helped me with something I’m studying at work. This essay is about the long-standing project to simulate the brain of the nematode C. elegans , one of the few organisms whose brain is both sophisticated and yet small enough to model (302 neurons).

10. Meet the fungi finders (New Humanist):

Fun reporting about global mycological efforts. “The creation of global mushroom maps is unearthing new species and teaching us how they support Earth’s ecosystem”