it's lily's world and you're all living in it

You know when you start becoming impressive simply because you're old (shoutout to my 100 year-old grandpa! It truly is impressive), or — this might be racy but I swear I'm drawing on recently acquired academic teachings and case studies — because you have something like a physical disability and the world expects nothing of you but then you do something completely within your realm of possibility and people are disproportionately impressed? Basically, you become impressive for just being you (I swear I'm going somewhere with this!). Well, the past week has made me look at humanity in a whole new light — albeit not very much light because sun exposure is still quite limited (also I just learned how to type an em dash on purpose, can you tell!? I swear I'm not using AI! ) — or rather, anyone who lives in sub-20 degree conditions on a regular basis in a whole new light. Chicago got so cold last week that some news reports were saying it would feel as cold as it does on A...

Happy New Year! I have decided that 2026 will be a year of knowledge, for myself and for all of you lucky folks. I therefore decided to create an ongoing list of questions that frequently cross my mind, and that I'm sure the general public also wonders about. I was originally just going to list the questions here, but then I thought of something better: I could also list the answers! Ignorance can certainly be bliss, but in this Age of Information, I see no good reason why I shouldn't take a few minutes out of my day to dispel my wonders.  So here it goes: 1) How many layers does an onion have? How many do you remove when cooking? After extensive research (ok I'll admit, I wasn't willing to spend more than like 15 minutes doing this) I decided to consult the only trustworthy-seeming site out there on this subject matter: the National Onion Association (founded in 1913!). According to a handy dandy handbook they published, it is advised to begin cutting onions by "...