Blog

  • This CEO went from folding clothes at Nordstrom to being Jeff Bezos’ right hand man—the billionaire told him to delegate to his employees more

    This CEO went from folding clothes at Nordstrom to being Jeff Bezos’ right hand man—the billionaire told him to delegate to his employees more

    During Greg Hart’s monotonous college job of folding t-shirts and jeans at Nordstrom, he never imagined that one day he’d be right-hand man to one of the most notable CEOs in the world—or even be an executive himself.

    But after landing a job at Amazon in the late 1990s—when it was a bookstore-focused startup—Hart started his steep climb up the corporate ladder. In 2009, he had worked his way up to Jeff Bezos’ technical advisor, a chief-of-staff-equivalent role internally known as “the shadow.”

    Now, as a new CEO of Coursera, Hart is taking the lessons he learned sitting next to the now third-richest man in the world (with a net worth of $241 billion) to transform the world of educational technology. That includes, he says, being someone who is always willing to be curious and to listen to your gut—even if the data might not back you up.

    “One of the things that Jeff would regularly say is when the data and the anecdotes don’t align, trust the anecdotes,” Hart tells Fortune. “Because it probably means that you’re either measuring the wrong thing in the data, or that the data is telling you something that you’re just not seeing yet.”

    This mantra would prove especially relevant in Hart’s life after he was tapped to lead Amazon’s creation of Alexa—a level of success he hopes to emulate at Coursera.

    “(Coursera) is one of the leaders in the edtech space, certainly,” Hart says. “But hasn’t yet achieved what I would call the true breakout success that I was fortunate to have seen when I was at Amazon.”

    Reshaping edtech with lessons learned from Amazon and Alexa

    While serving as technical advisor, Hart was asked to turn Bezos’ two-sentence idea for the implementation of virtual assistant technology into a product found in consumers’ homes, later known as Alexa. 

    With little background in hardware or software, Hart recalls being hesitant: “Why am I the right person to tackle this challenge?”

    “He (Bezos) was unbelievably gracious. He said, ‘you’ll do fine, you’ll figure it out,’” Hart says.

    Now with more than 600 million Alexa devices sold, it’s clear Hart did figure it out—in part thanks to the belief Bezos instilled in his subordinates. That lesson is one Hart says was critical in making Amazon grow from a bookstore to an e-commerce conglomerate.

    “Pushing decisions down as close to the customer as possible was certainly something that I learned from Jeff,” he says. “The fewer decisions that have to go to the CEO, the faster the organization will move.”

    Moving quickly will likely play in Coursera’s favor considering the rapidly changing world of education, including AI’s intersection with skill development. 

    One of Coursera’s biggest competitors, 2U (which also owns edX), filed for bankruptcy last year and became a private company. Coursera’s public performance hasn’t been spectacular, either. Its share price currently sits at about $8.50, a far cry from its 2022 IPO at about $45.

    But in the next five years, a predicted 1 billion people will gain internet access, according to Bloomberg, and thus would have access to Coursera’s thousands of online learning opportunities, that include partnerships with both industry and universities including Google, Microsoft, and IBM as well as Stanford University, University of Michigan, and University of Pennsylvania.

    “There is a huge opportunity for Coursera, not just to serve all the people who are online today and give them access to world class education so they can transform their lives, but also to do that for the population that will come online,” Hart says.

    Hart’s advice for Gen Z: Optimize for learning—and ask why

    For young people looking to push their careers up the corporate ladder and emulate a jump from Nordstrom to Amazon,Hart’s advice is simple: Focus on learning—not on a flashy job title or cushy salary.

    “Don’t optimize for titles, don’t optimize for salary, optimize for learning. And if you do that in the long run, it will benefit you,” he tells Fortune.

    And while that advice may sound on-brand coming from the CEO of an education company, treating your career like a marathon, not a sprint, and spending time discovering your broader interests is a mantra echoed by other business leaders, including Hart’s former coworker, Andy Jassy. 

    “I have a 21-year-old son and a 24-year-old daughter, and one of the things I see with them and their peers is they all feel like they have to know what they want to do for their life at that age,” Jassy, the current Amazon CEO, said on the podcast, How Leaders Lead with David Novak. “And I really don’t believe that’s true.”

    “I tried a lot of things, and I think that early on it’s just as important to learn what you don’t want to do as what you want to do, because it actually helps you figure out what you want to do,” Jassy added.

    And while Jassy admits career success involves an element of luck and may include multiple setbacks, remaining persistent is what ultimately might land you a shot at the corner office. 

    “I feel like my journey or adventure was a lot of luck, and I think maybe one of the things I did best was not overthink it,” Jassy added to Novak.

    Continue Reading

  • Exynos 2500 trades blows with the Snapdragon 8 Elite in GPU benchmark but lags behind in CPU performance

    Exynos 2500 trades blows with the Snapdragon 8 Elite in GPU benchmark but lags behind in CPU performance

    The Galaxy Z Flip7 looks set to deliver identical CPU performance to the Galaxy Z Flip6. (Image Source: Samsung)

    The Samsung Galaxy Z Flip7 has now made several trips to Geekbench ahead of its official debut at Unpacked. The foldable impresses in the OpenCL test but only performs as well as the last-gen Snapdragon 8 Gen 3 on the CPU side.

    A few weeks ago, Samsung quietly unveiled the Exynos 2500 as its flagship chipset for the year. While the Exynos 2500 isn’t widely expected to keep up with its peers in the CPU department, it appears things may be different on the GPU side.

    As shared by Abhishek Yadav, the Exynos 2500 on Samsung’s upcoming Galaxy Z Flip7 records a score of 18,601 on Geekbench’s OpenCL test. That’s a respectable score, as Geekbench’s official chart lists the Snapdragon 8 Elite for Galaxy-powered Samsung Galaxy S25 Ultra with 18,365 on the same test. 

    While this is just one benchmark—and, as such, not definitive evidence of the chipset’s performance—it does seem like the Exynos 2500’s RDNA 3-based Xclipse 950 GPU will be competent at the very least. That isn’t particularly surprising, as the Exynos 2400 outpaced the A17 Pro and Snapdragon 8 Gen 3 on a several GPU benchmarks as well. 

    Things are less impressive on the CPU side, unfortunately. The Galaxy Z Flip7 in its “SM-F766B” guise has made multiple trips to Geekbench and mostly underperformed. The last of those visits saw the foldable score 2,313 and 7,965 on the single-core and multi-core tests respectively, with both of those scores indicating CPU performance merely on par with last year’s Snapdragon 8 Gen 3. 

    The Exynos 2500 only matches the Snapdragon 8 Gen 3 in CPU tests.
    The Exynos 2500 only matches the Snapdragon 8 Gen 3 in CPU tests.
    The Exynos 2500 looks set to offer competitive GPU performance.
    The Exynos 2500 looks set to offer competitive GPU performance.

    Continue Reading

  • NEOC issues alert of severe rainfall, potential flooding – RADIO PAKISTAN

    1. NEOC issues alert of severe rainfall, potential flooding  RADIO PAKISTAN
    2. NDMA issues monsoon alert, warns of flood risk across Pakistan until July 10  Ptv.com.pk
    3. Floods devastate Dadhocha villages  The Express Tribune
    4. Heavy rain, flooding likely from today  Dawn
    5. Karachi receives new rain spell  ARY News

    Continue Reading

  • Azma Bukhari says religious unity prevails across Pakistan on Ashura

    Azma Bukhari says religious unity prevails across Pakistan on Ashura

    Punjab Information Minister Azma Bukhari has reaffirmed the presence of religious harmony across the country on the day of Ashura, urging citizens to shun those inciting sectarianism.

    Speaking to media in Faisalabad, she said Ashura symbolizes the spirit of sacrifice and stressed that maintaining peace is a shared responsibility.

    She outlined that the Punjab government has enforced comprehensive security arrangements for Muharram processions and gatherings.

    For the first time, a cyber patrolling force has been deployed during Muharram to monitor online activity, Bukhari said, adding that the entire provincial administration is actively managing Ashura-related events.

    She emphasized public safety and service delivery as key government priorities, citing improved sanitation, installation of cold water stations along procession routes, and inspection visits in various districts. She also noted receiving goodwill messages for the Chief Minister during her visits.

    The minister revealed that objectionable and sectarian content on social media is being strictly monitored, with several arrests made and 417 hate-spreading websites blocked so far.

    Bukhari concluded that the government’s actions are not symbolic, but practical efforts to uphold peace, calling on the public to show mutual respect and reject divisive forces.


    Continue Reading

  • Ancient Neanderthal ‘Fat Factory’ Reveals How Advanced They Really Were : ScienceAlert

    Ancient Neanderthal ‘Fat Factory’ Reveals How Advanced They Really Were : ScienceAlert

    The Neanderthals are our closest extinct relatives, and they continue to fascinate as we peer back through tens of thousands of years of history.

    In a new discovery about this mysterious yet often familiar species, researchers have found ancient evidence of a Neanderthal “fat factory” in what is now Germany.

    Operational around 125,000 years ago, the factory would’ve been a place where Neanderthals broke and crushed the bones of large mammals to extract valuable bone marrow and grease, used as a valuable extra food source.

    Related: Neanderthal DNA Exists in Humans, But One Piece Is Mysteriously Missing

    According to scientists, this is the earliest evidence yet for this type of sophisticated, large-scale bone processing, including both bone marrow and grease: the first confirmation Neanderthals were also doing this some 100,000 years before our species made it to Europe.

    “This was intensive, organised, and strategic,” says archaeologist Lutz Kindler from the MONREPOS Archaeological Research Center in Germany.

    “Neanderthals were clearly managing resources with precision – planning hunts, transporting carcasses, and rendering fat in a task-specific area. They understood both the nutritional value of fat and how to access it efficiently – most likely involving caching carcass parts at places in the landscape for later transport to and use at the grease rendering site.”

    The researchers found their evidence on a site called Neumark-Nord in eastern Germany, not far from the city of Halle. They uncovered more than 100,000 bone fragments from what are thought to be at least 172 large mammals, including horses and deer.

    Researchers at work at the Neumark-Nord site. (Kindler et al., Science Advances, 2025)

    A good proportion of the bones showed cut marks and signs of intentional breakage, pointing to deliberate butchering – these weren’t just leftovers from a hunt. There were also indications of tool use and fires in the same location, all in a relatively small area.

    Add all of that together, and it seems clear that some kind of systematic, organized bone processing was going on here. Similar processes have been linked to Neanderthal sites before, but not at this level of scale or sophistication.

    “Bone grease production requires a certain volume of bones to make this labour-intensive processing worthwhile and hence the more bones assembled, the more profitable it becomes,” says archaeologist Sabine Gaudzinski-Windheuser from MONREPOS.

    We can add this to the long list of studies that have revealed Neanderthals were much smarter than they’re often made out to be. Thanks to recent research we know they were adept swimmers, capable brewers, and abstract thinkers – who raised their kids and used speech patterns in a similar way to humans.

    Ultimately though, Homo sapiens thrived and survived, while Neanderthals died out. That’s another story that archaeologists are busy investigating the whys and wherefores of, but all we have of the Neanderthals now are the remains and the sites they left behind – which will no doubt give up more revelations in the future.

    “The sheer size and extraordinary preservation of the Neumark-Nord site complex gives us a unique chance to study how Neanderthals impacted their environment, both animal and plant life,” says computer scientist Fulco Scherjon from MONREPOS.

    “That’s incredibly rare for a site this old – and it opens exciting new possibilities for future research.”

    The research has been published in Science Advances.

    Continue Reading

  • Stock-market investors went from panic to ‘Goldilocks.’ Are they getting ahead of themselves? – MarketWatch

    1. Stock-market investors went from panic to ‘Goldilocks.’ Are they getting ahead of themselves?  MarketWatch
    2. Nasdaq Composite and S&P500: Jobs Data Drives Weekly Rally to New Peaks  FXEmpire
    3. Stocks hit another record as House sends Trump $4.5 trillion bill to kick off July 4 weekend  Fortune
    4. S&P 500 Hit Record High Ahead of Holiday Break  Action Forex
    5. UK’s Octopus Energy weighs $14 billion demerger of tech arm Kraken, Sky News says  MarketScreener

    Continue Reading

  • Stock-market investors went from panic to ‘Goldilocks.’ Are they getting ahead of themselves?

    Stock-market investors went from panic to ‘Goldilocks.’ Are they getting ahead of themselves?

    By William Watts

    ‘Strength begets strength’, says ClearBridge’s Schulze after S&P 500’s rapid rally off April lows

    Tariffs? Deficits? So what?

    Stock-market investors who were in full-fledged panic just three months ago in the wake of President Donald Trump’s “liberation day” unveiling of sweeping tariffs on U.S. trading partners went into the long Fourth of July weekend with the S&P 500 SPX and Nasdaq Composite COMP in record territory. That’s even with a 90-day pause on those tariffs due to expire on Wednesday.

    “The direction of travel for tariffs has really been one way over the last couple months, which has been a positive direction,” Jeff Schulze, head of economic and market strategy at ClearBridge Investments, with $180.4 billion in assets under management, told MarketWatch.

    Stocks stumbled hard after the April 2 tariff announcement, with the S&P 500 finishing nearly 19% below its February record and on the cusp of a bear market, before roaring back after Trump announced the pause. Stock-market bulls barely looked back as equities extended their climb, with the S&P 500 and Nasdaq both pushing back into record territory in June.

    Investors have been soothed by a framework agreement with China that helped cool tensions between Washington and Beijing. And while flare-ups between the U.S. and trading partners are possible, the expectation is that the pause will be extended for countries negotiating levies, all of which could make the July 9 deadline a “non-event,” Schulze said.

    “The setup for stocks during the second half of 2025 is quite Goldilocks” – neither too warm nor too cold, but just right – as investors eye potential trade deals, the extension of the 2017 tax cuts with passage of Trump’s massive tax and spending bill, calming geopolitical tensions and a Fed that’s warming up to interest-rate cuts, said Clark Bellin, president and chief investment officer of Lincoln, Neb.-based Bellwether Wealth, which manages $630 million in assets, in emailed comments.

    Congressional Republicans wrestled Trump’s fiscal legislation over the finish line shortly after markets saw an early close Thursday. That was also described as a positive for stocks, with tax cuts and other measures set to provide a fiscal tailwind.

    “Enthusiasm is also heavily motivated by the fact that this growing economy will receive supply-side stimulus,” said Jose Torres, chief economist at Interactive Brokers, in a note, referring to the legislation.

    Read: Trump’s big bill just passed the House. Here are the winners and losers as it goes to his desk.

    So much for the bond-market vigilantes. Volatile moves in Treasury yields beginning last fall were tied by some investors to fears that Trump’s fiscal agenda would result in a further surge to the deficit. The legislation passed Thursday is projected to add $3.4 trillion to the U.S. government’s $36.2 trillion debt over the next 10 years.

    Treasury yields rose Thursday, but that was driven more by good news on the economic front after a stronger-than-expected June jobs report. The yield on the 10-year note BX:TMUBMUSD10Y finished the week at 4.339%, up 5 basis points on the day but down 46 basis points from its 52-week high near 4.8% set in January. Yields and bond prices move opposite each other.

    Deficit estimates don’t account for potential tariff revenues, which were $15.6 billion in April according to Bipartisan Policy Center data, analysts at Jefferies said in a Thursday note. “The key question for equity investors is whether the tax incentives will meaningfully boost economic growth and thus rein in the growth in public debt over the next decade,” they wrote.

    Stocks rallied Thursday after June nonfarm payrolls rose a stronger-than-expected 147,000 and the unemployment rate fell to 4.1% from 4.2%. Economists didn’t love all aspects of the report, but investors were in a buying mood. The S&P 500 rose 0.8% to close at a record 6,279.35, while the Nasdaq advanced 1% to end at a record 20,601.10. The Dow Jones Industrial Average DJIA gained 344.11 points, or 0.8%, to close at 44,828.53, off 0.4% from its record close of 45,014.04 set on Dec. 4.

    See: The June jobs report is grimy under the hood. Here’s a few key numbers that tell us why.

    Investors may be reluctant to stand in the way of the stock market after such a ferocious rebound from the April lows. Schulze noted that the 19.8% 50-day rally off the April 8 low was the ninth-strongest such rally for the S&P 500 going back to 1950. Strong 50-day rallies have tended to be followed by impressive gains over the subsequent three-, six- and 12-month periods, he said (see table below).

    “Strength usually begets strength,” he said.

    Some strategists still see reasons to be cautious.

    For one thing, the Wall Street consensus appears overly optimistic when it comes to the tariff outlook and thus the growth rate in calendar year 2025, said Scott Wren, global market strategist at Wells Fargo Investment Institute, in a note. As tariffs arrive in force, the economy is certain to slow, pushing up unemployment and denting consumer spending.

    “Our feel is that stocks are ahead of themselves, and as a result, we are looking to trim positions in markets and sectors that we find overvalued, particularly U.S. small-cap equities and the industrials and consumer discretionary sectors” in the S&P 500, which have done well in recent months, he said.

    Investors could hold those funds or reinvest in sectors that appear more favorable, including tech, financials, energy, utilities and communications services, he wrote. Or, since stocks aren’t cheap, they may opt “to hold those funds to reinvest if the downside volatility we expect develops.”

    -William Watts

    This content was created by MarketWatch, which is operated by Dow Jones & Co. MarketWatch is published independently from Dow Jones Newswires and The Wall Street Journal. 

    
  (END) Dow Jones Newswires
    

    
  07-06-25 0801ET
    

    Copyright (c) 2025 Dow Jones & Company, Inc.

    Continue Reading

  • Weedkiller ingredient widely used in US can damage organs and gut bacteria, research shows | Herbicides

    Weedkiller ingredient widely used in US can damage organs and gut bacteria, research shows | Herbicides

    The herbicide ingredient used to replace glyphosate in Roundup and other weedkiller products can kill gut bacteria and damage organs in multiple ways, new research shows.

    The ingredient, diquat, is widely employed in the US as a weedkiller in vineyards and orchards, and is increasingly sprayed elsewhere as the use of controversial herbicide substances such as glyphosate and paraquat drops in the US.

    But the new piece of data suggests diquat is more toxic than glyphosate, and the substance is banned over its risks in the UK, EU, China and many other countries. Still, the EPA has resisted calls for a ban, and Roundup formulas with the ingredient hit the shelves last year.

    “From a human health perspective, this stuff is quite a bit nastier than glyphosate so we’re seeing a regrettable substitution, and the ineffective regulatory structure is allowing it,” said Nathan Donley, science director with the Center For Biological Diversity, which advocates for stricter pesticide regulations but was not involved in the new research. “Regrettable substitution” is a scientific term used to describe the replacement of a toxic substance in a consumer product with an ingredient that is also toxic.

    Diquat is also thought to be a neurotoxin, carcinogen and linked to Parkinson’s disease. An October analysis of EPA data by the Friends of the Earth non-profit found it is about 200 times more toxic than glyphosate in terms of chronic exposure.

    Bayer, which makes Roundup, faced nearly 175,000 lawsuits alleging that the product’s users were harmed by the product. Bayer, which bought Monsanto in 2018, reformulated Roundup after the International Agency for Research on Cancer classified glyphosate as a possible carcinogen.

    The new review of scientific literature in part focuses on the multiple ways in which diquat damages organs and gut bacteria, including by reducing the level of proteins that are key pieces of the gut lining. The weakening can allow toxins and pathogens to move from the stomach into the bloodstream, and trigger inflammation in the intestines and throughout the body. Meanwhile, diquat can inhibit the production of beneficial bacteria that maintain the gut lining.

    Damage to the lining also inhibits the absorption of nutrients and energy metabolism, the authors said.

    The research further scrutinizes how the substance harms the kidneys, lungs and liver. Diquat “causes irreversible structural and functional damage to the kidneys” because it can destroy kidney cells’ membranes and interfere with cell signals. The effects on the liver are similar, and the ingredient causes the production of proteins that inflame the organ.

    Meanwhile, it seems to attack the lungs by triggering inflammation that damages the organ’s tissue. More broadly, the inflammation caused by diquat may cause multiple organ dysfunction syndrome, a scenario in which organ systems begin to fail.

    The authors note that many of the studies are on rodents and more research on low, long-term exposure is needed. Bayer did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

    Despite the risks amid a rise in diquat’s use, the EPA is not reviewing the chemical, and even non-profits that push for tighter pesticide regulations have largely focused their attention elsewhere.

    Donley said that was in part because US pesticide regulations are so weak that advocates are tied up with battles over ingredients like glyphosate, paraquat and chlorpyrifos – substances that are banned elsewhere but still widely used here. Diquat is “overshadowed” by those ingredients.

    “Other countries have banned diquat, but in the US we’re still fighting the fights that Europe won 20 years ago,” Donley said. “It hasn’t gotten to the radar of most groups and that really says a lot about the sad and sorry state of pesticides in the US.”

    Some advocates have accused the EPA of being captured by industry, and Donley said US pesticide laws were so weak that it was difficult for the agency to ban ingredients, even if the will exists. For example, the agency banned chlorpyrifos in 2022, but a court overturned the decision after industry sued.

    Moreover, the EPA’s pesticides office seems to have a philosophy that states that toxic pesticides are a “necessary evil”, Donley said.

    “When you approach an issue from that lens there’s only so much you will do,” he said.

    Continue Reading

  • My traditional in-laws say we’re not carrying on the “family legacy.” But we have daughters.

    My traditional in-laws say we’re not carrying on the “family legacy.” But we have daughters.

    Care and Feeding is Slate’s parenting advice column. Have a question for Care and Feeding? Submit it here.

    Dear Care and Feeding,

    My husband, “Wade,” and I are Chinese-American. My family has been in the U.S. for generations, while he is the first of his family to be born here. Wade and I have two daughters, ages 2 and 4, whom we adore. The problem is my very traditional in-laws, who are applying pressure to us to try again to have a son. Wade thinks we should just grey rock their attempts to convince us to have another child for the sake of carrying on the family legacy—i.e., let them waste their breath. But I worry about our girls as they get older and are better able to understand the meaning behind their grandparents’ constant harping on this. I fear they’ll think their grandparents love them less than they would if they were boys; I don’t want them to feel inferior because of their gender. What’s a good way of dealing with this without offending my in-laws?

    —The Old Beliefs Should Have Stayed in the Old World

    Dear Beliefs.

    I’ll admit, if I were you, I would be honest with them—I think you can do that without offending them. You and your husband might tell them that you’re very happy with your two children and have no plans for a third. You can do this without getting in the weeds about sons versus daughters (and if they say—and they will say!—“But you don’t have a son! You must have a son!”, my advice would be to repeat what you’ve just said, and to do so as many times as necessary, without engaging with what they see as the “real” issue). You are not going to change them, and only they can decide to leave “the old beliefs” behind: You can’t make them. I would further urge you to speak frankly with them about your concern that if they continue to talk about this in the presence of your daughters, it will hurt them and harm their relationship with them. Tell your in-laws they are not to bring this up when their grandchildren are present—period. Tell them you do not wish for your children, who love and value their grandparents, to come to believe that their grandparents don’t love and value them.

    If you and your husband cannot bring yourselves to tell his parents that you have no desire to have another child—even without breaking the news that you couldn’t care less about providing the son they so desperately want you to have—I’m not against your husband’s plan of letting them waste their breath and paying them no nevermind. But even if you go that route, somehow managing to spend the next 10 to 20 years making noncommittal noises or changing the subject every time they bring up the importance of your bringing a boy into the world, that doesn’t mean you shouldn’t speak up about the well-being of your (actual) children. You must still tell them how important it is to you that they not speak of this in your daughters’ presence, and explain why. If they continue to do it anyway, gather your daughters and leave the room. (When you’re next alone with their grandparents, repeat yourself again: This is not acceptable. This may inspire them to tell you, yet again, how crucial it is that you provide them a grandson. If you are determined to keep this charade going, you might say, “Yes, I know, but I must tell you that the repetition of your deep desire for one is not going to make him come along any faster.”)

    And more important than any of this: Make sure your daughters know that they are loved and valued, that you and their father treasure them exactly as they are.

    Please keep questions short (<150 words), and don‘t submit the same question to multiple columns. We are unable to edit or remove questions after publication. Use pseudonyms to maintain anonymity. Your submission may be used in other Slate advice columns and may be edited for publication.

    Dear Care and Feeding,

    My son “Oliver” is 2 ½ years old and going through potty training. We got him some books on the subject and have shown him some videos to help encourage him. The problem is that he has become fixated on the topic. Now everything is about where pee and poop come from, where it’s supposed to go, how it’s something every living creature does, etc. He will initiate these conversations with perfect strangers when we are out; last week, we were at a restaurant when my husband needed to take him to the men’s room. Oliver came running back excitedly to the table and shouted, “I went pee-pee in the potty!” in front of everyone. I realize this is a phase, but I find it terribly embarrassing. Is there any way I can teach him discretion without inhibiting his progress?

    —Pooped by All the Poop Talk

    Dear Poop Talk,

    I’m sorry to have to be the one to tell you this, but you’re going to have to get over this. You have a toddler! He’s excited about pee and poop and fascinated by everything he’s learned about it (and the whole process of food-to-waste-product really is kind of amazing, if you think about it, no? Oh, right, I forgot: You do not want to think about it). When kids are excited and fascinated by a subject, they want to talk about it. To everyone. Just you wait until he gets to the all-dinosaurs-all-the-time phase.

    I say let him. It’s your embarrassment you need to get to work on—or, rather, your dread of being embarrassed. What’s so awful about a little embarrassment? (Or, an even better question: What is it exactly that there is to be so embarrassed about?) The appropriate response to his proud announcement was, “Well done! Good job!”, not, “Shhh!” And if he poop-chats up a stranger in the grocery store, and that stranger seems taken aback/distressed instead of amused or even just politely tolerant (recognizing that the person trying earnestly to engage them in a discussion of excrement’s amazing journey isn’t even 3 years old), you can always say, “Ah, well, potty training!” as you sail past. If a toddler uses hate speech (picked up somewhere, just repeating it as children do), that’s one thing: It’s never too soon to teach a child not to be hateful, racist, bigoted, or cruel. But teaching a toddler to be discreet is not only a losing battle, it’s also an effective way of teaching him that his exuberance is something for him to be ashamed of.

    Catch Up on Care and Feeding

    · Missed earlier columns this week? Read them here.
    · Discuss this column in the Slate Parenting Facebook group!

    Dear Care and Feeding,

    I am a married man of many years. In my youth, I had a number of hot rods and have always been a car guy. I had a successful career and now have a net worth of $2 million, and the only debt we have is a small mortgage. There is a particular sports car I would like to purchase that is not expensive. My wife objects—she thinks I would look like an idiot driving this car at my age. All I want to do with it is take it to local car shows and cars-and-coffee meetups—that sort of thing. Is it all right for me to buy it anyway?

    —Or Is She Right?

    Dear Or Is She,

    Does it matter if she’s right or wrong? The question is whether you care if you look like an “idiot,” in your wife’s words. (I’m not weighing in—I have no opinion on this matter. I don’t care enough about cars—or even know enough about cars—to make a judgment about the person driving one.)

    If you want this sports car and you can afford it, and it will give you pleasure and do no harm to anyone, it’s time to search your soul: If you fear you might look foolish in your new hot rod, and the thought of that is painful enough to diminish the pleasure you imagine owning it will bring you, then don’t take that chance. If you consider the possibility of being judged harshly—old man in a hot car, ha ha, poor fool—and it horrifies you, as I suppose it horrifies your wife, then you should probably stick to the sedan or SUV you usually drive. But if you don’t care what people think (and why should you?), go ahead and tell your wife that. And tell her she doesn’t have to (ever) sit in the passenger seat, to spare her what I assume is her fear of being looked at as the pathetic old fool’s poor, clueless wife.

    —Michelle

    More Advice From Slate

    I am mom to a 7-month-old. We live in a pretty conservative area, and I work in a male-dominated industry. In fact, all of my co-workers are men who have or had stay-at-home wives. When I was pregnant, several of my co-workers did not expect me to come back to work. Though I told them we planned on using day care, I guess they assumed some maternal instinct would come over me and I’d quit. They said terrible things to me.


    Continue Reading

  • Buck Moon 2025: How to spot one of the lowest full moons of the year — and the farthest from the sun

    Buck Moon 2025: How to spot one of the lowest full moons of the year — and the farthest from the sun

    The first full moon of astronomical summer in the Northern Hemisphere is about to rise. Known as the Buck Moon, it will turn full Thursday, July 10 and will be one of the lowest-hanging full moons of the year.

    Although the moon officially reaches its full phase at 4:38 p.m. EDT on June 10, that moment occurs while the moon is still below the horizon for viewers in North America. The best time to see the full Buck Moon will be at moonrise, at dusk, on Thursday evening, when the moon will appear on the eastern horizon as an orange orb. Use a moon calculator to determine the exact time you should look for the moon from your location.

    Continue Reading