2026-02-09 21:00:00
Shoveling out a parking spot is a pain, and many snowy places have a culture where when you leave you put some kind of " space saver" (aka "parking chair", "dibs", etc) to reserve the space for when you come back. While you don't have a legal right to the space, there's common knowledge that if you park in someone's spot you're running a significant risk of them vandalizing your car.
Aside from depending on the implicit threat of property damage, it's a bad system: it only works if everyone uses cars with the same commuting pattern. My sister works in early childhood intervention, which is one of several professions where you're traveling to people's houses during the day. In neighborhoods where space savers are common, there can be many open spots, but each one is saved. Moving the space saver, even just for the duration of the visit, risks a slashed tire.
courtesy of kgnixer
Very reasonably, they're prohibited in many cities, including Cambridge and Somerville, but that isn't enough to disrupt the culture in areas where it's widespread.
It's also hard to opt out as an individual. If everyone else is saving their spaces and you don't, then when you get back your spot will very likely be taken.
What would disrupt the culture, though, would be the mayor making an announcement. Now, mayors already make announcements about this, but they're things like "please don't use space savers." That doesn't work: it won't sway the intended audience. Instead, the announcement should target the people who don't like the space saver system, but today they leave space savers alone because they don't want some unknowing stranger to face unjustified retaliation: "if you see a space saver, please take it out of the spot".
This gives social cover to start moving things. You're not a troublemaker, you're an upstanding citizen. The mayor doesn't need many people to take action: just a few enthusiastic people can thoroughly break the link from "there's a car parked in the spot I saved" to "they must have moved my space saver" and hence to "and so I should vandalize their car." The announcement makes it common knowledge that this is no longer a reliable link.
The mayor, as a centralized elected representative, is a good way to do this, though it would also be possible for a group of people, or even one really dedicated person, to do it. What you need to do is remove a lot of space savers, and make sure it's well known that the people removing space savers aren't the people parking in the previously-saved spots. Possibly an active group that put discarded space savers nearby with a note taped on saying "removed by the Space Unsavers" could do it, though you need to keep the object close enough that the spacer finds it and sees the note while also moving it far enough that the parker likely didn't realize they were parking in a formerly saved spot.
I did a little looking to see if anyone had tried this, and the closest I came was cities coming around to collect them, often as part of trash pickup or some number of hours after lifting a snow emergency. This doesn't work very well: it's much easier to work around a single predictable pass than individuals removing objects throughout the day, and it also legitimizes using space savers up until the announced pickup.
Does anyone know about anyone trying this? Did it work? If I lived in a part of town with an illegal and unpopular—yet persistent—space saver culture, I'd be tempted to try the organize-neighbors version. Or perhaps start by suggesting it to the mayor.
2026-02-06 21:00:00
I recently got a Thermal Master P1 infrared camera attachment for my phone. The goal was a house project, but it's also a great toy, especially with the kids. Getting a room pitch black but still being able to 'see' with the phone was fun for a bit. The real fun, though, was in exploring to observe all these thermal properties we'd never thought about.
Here's my selfie:
Light is warmer, dark is cooler. My glasses aren't cool, they're just IR-opaque. I already knew cheeks and noses were squishier than foreheads, but it's neat to see that in coloring.
Here's my 4yo, outside in ~30F weather:
The patterns are clearer, especially at the edge of the cheeks.
Here's a different angle:
The gaps in the hair are neat, and you can see the bow on her headband clearly.
Here's the cat:
This all makes sense in hindsight, knowing that the face is less furry and that there are shifting parts in the body fur, but it's neat to see.
The kids were excited about how this lets you see back into the past. Here's heat-fingerprints on a window sill I touched:
The print from one socked foot and one bare foot:
A stand mixer that had been running:
A car that had been sitting for a long time:
One that was cold to the touch, but apparently had been run recently:
Less fun but more usefully you can also see where buildings are losing heat. I'm planing to take it out Sunday morning when it's ~4F here and assess our house, but in the meantime here's a nearby house losing heat through its basement:
If I look very closely I can just make out the framing inside the wall. I'll try this again when it's even colder, and if I'm lucky I can get a bunch of pictures showing where the studs are throughout our exterior walls.
I do wish there were a way to connect the sensor to modern image processing algorithms like my phone uses for its regular camera. Combining the information from several shots in quick succession could give much higher quality, and I feel my eye doing this automatically when watching it live on the phone screen. I guess I could take a video and then post-process?
2026-02-01 21:00:00
This post has spoilers for My Neighbor Totoro, Frozen, Bambi, and the Lion King
People at different stages of development enjoy different things in movies. Some of the best children's movies are able to make things scary or intense for the adults without being too much for little kids.
For example, in My Neighbor Totoro everyone is worried that a small child may have fallen in the lake: she's gone missing, they find a sandal floating in the pond, you see people dredging the pond looking for her, and it's very clear to adults and older kids that the worry is she has drowned. But to a little kid it's much less obvious; the actual dialog only says that they found a sandal. This gives a very intense and emotional scene, but only for people who can handle it.
Similarly, many kids' movies need to get the parents out of the way so the kids can be put in situations of unusual responsibility. Some are pretty blatant about this (ex: Bambi, The Lion King) and just very clearly kill the parent on screen, but Frozen handles it way better. You see, wordlessly, the parents boarding a ship, the ship in a storm, a big wave, no ship, a funeral, and then "Elsa gets to be queen!" Clear to adults, who can put the hints together and know what a funeral looks like, much less clear to kids.
There are lots of movies that manage this kind of differential targeting with humor, since it's relatively easy to add jokes that will go over the kids' heads, but I'd love to see more of this in other areas.
(Another one that comes to mind is the way the opening sequence of Up is very powerful to adults, while little kids just get "she got old and isn't around anymore." I don't think this one is handled quite as well, though, because unlike the scenes in Totoro and Frozen, it doesn't really fit with the rest of the movie.)
2026-01-29 21:00:00
Very few people have been on a plane performing a barrel roll, but we could fix this. Commercial aircraft could roll in revenue service, and if you had your window shade down you wouldn't even notice it.
While there are many ways to roll an airplane that would cause complete havoc inside the cabin, a barrel roll can be performed as a "1g" maneuver. With careful control of the aircraft, the forces can be balanced so that you only ever feel close to 1g of apparent gravity, and it always is pulling you down into your seat.
This was famously completed by Tex Johnston, without authorization, in a prototype Boeing 707. As acrobatic maneuvers go it's very safe, because the stresses on the airframe are minimal. We could update the programming on any modern airliner to allow the pilot to trigger a barrel roll, and it could smoothly move the plane through the whole process.
A major reason we wouldn't do that today is it's not worth it for the manufacturer: it would be a lot of work to ensure the code was completely correct. I wonder if as programming, validation, and evaluation continue to get more automated the cost of adding this and getting it through regulatory approval would get low enough that we might see some airlines use this in marketing?
2026-01-16 21:00:00
It's a holiday. The cousins are over, and the kids are having a great time. Unfortunately, that includes rampaging through the kitchen. We're trying to cook, so there's a "no cutting through the kitchen" rule. Imagine enforcement looks like:
Kid: [dashes into kitchen, pursued by cousin]
Adult: Out of the kitchen!
Kid: Sorry! [Continues their path, leaving through the other door; escapes pursuit from more rule-abiding cousin]
This doesn't work! The kid got what they wanted out of this interaction, and isn't going to change their behavior. Instead, I need to make it be not worth their while:
Kid: [dashes into kitchen, pursued by cousin]
Adult: No cutting through the kitchen! [Physically rebuffs intruder]!
Kid: Sorry! [Forced to leave through the door they entered by; caught by cousin.]
Other examples:
Sneak candy, spit it out and forfeit dessert.
Use sibling's tablet time, lose your own.
Interrupt, be ignored.
The general principle is that if you want to limit behavior the combination of the gains from rule-breaking and penalty from punishment need to put the kid in a worse position than if they'd never broken the rule.
This isn't just a parenting thing: it's common to say that "crime should not pay", and many legal systems prohibit unjust enrichment. One place I'd like to see this implemented is airplane evacuation. If the safety announcements included "In the event of an emergency evacuation, any carry-on luggage you bring will be confiscated and destroyed. You will also be fined." we would have more JAL 516 (379 occupants, zero deaths) and less Aeroflot 1492 or Emirates 521.
2026-01-15 21:00:00
The "dance weekend" is a very common pattern for contra dance communities around the country. I think of the central example as something like:
Examples, from my 2025 calendar: Beantown Stomp, Chehalis, Dance in the Desert, Dancing Fish, Five Borough Fling, Fleur de Lis Fling, Hashdance, and Summer Soiree.
I've seen a bunch of misunderstandings that come from people not being on the same page about what is normal: many dance weekends are organized by volunteers, some of which are doing it for the first time; performers often are new to this as well. As someone who has both played for and organized dance weekends, I thought it might be helpful to try and write down what I think of as typical if an event is bringing in a band or caller from out of town.
Note that I'm trying to document the status quo here, saying "this is" and not "this is what should be". I would be sad if in places where the status quo isn't great people pointed at this doc and said "Jeff says it's supposed to be that way"; this post is not doing that! Additionally, performers and events are of course free to agree on something that isn't the most common arrangement!
As of the beginning of 2026, here's what I think of as the most common arrangement:
Housing: the event provides accommodation, most commonly at someone's house. Performers may need to share rooms, but not beds. If the best travel option means coming a day early or staying a day late the event still provides housing for those additional days. If the performer wants to stay in town longer for sightseeing, that's on them. If the performer has accessibility needs (ex: pet allergies) this is good to discuss up front.
Travel: the event pays for round trip economy travel, by air if driving would be too long. My sense is that flying becomes customary at the 5-hour mark, but if you're in the 4hr-7hr range it's worth checking in. With air travel this isn't a commitment to take the literally cheapest flight, but performers should use their judgement and try to save the event money. Travel includes bags and/or early boarding if that's needed for the musician to safely bring their instrument, but make sure the event isn't surprised. Flight reimbursement is due when the flight is paid for, not at the event.
Travel includes the cost of getting from one's house to the airport, such as public transit, taxi, or airport parking. Events are often not thinking about this cost, though, so if it's going to be significant it's good to bring it up.
For driving from out of town, reimbursing at the IRS mileage rate is standard, but organizations sometimes want to reimburse only gas and tolls. While the gas and tolls are most directly attributable to this trip, the other expenses (purchase, insurance, maintenance) that go into the IRS rate are real costs too.
Instruments: the performers are expected to bring their instruments, with the event covering the cost. The exception is when this isn't economical, which most often happens with keyboard: this might cost $300 to safely fly round trip. In that case the event should provide a keyboard, typically on loan from someone in the community. The event should make sure the instrument is good quality, but performers should not expect exact models (events are generally not going to be renting instruments). Other examples of instruments (or equipment) I'd expect an event to supply as needed include amps, drum kits, drum thrones, and double basses.
Real pianos are even trickier: many venues don't have them, and the ones that do exist are often poorly maintained and out of tune. At this point I wouldn't recommend trying to play dance weekends on real pianos, but if this is important to you definitely bring it up with the event early.
As someone who plays a lot of instruments, there's also a sense that performers should be thinking about what's economical to fly with in deciding what their setup should be. If you'll need more than a checked item, carry-on item, and personal item, it's worth thinking about whether you could simplify your setup.
Transportation: the event provides required transportation during the event, primarily between accomodations and the venue. Sometimes this is letting the performers use a car, sometimes it's giving rides, sometimes it's everything within walking distance.
Food: the event provides food. This can be food at dancers' houses, take-out, reimbursing restaurants; whatever works best for the event as long as the performers are fed. Food while traveling is usually not covered, though I think there's a good argument that it should be. Events should check with performers about dietary restrictions, and performers should also be proactive in communicating their dietary restrictions.
Sound: the event provides the sound system, and someone to run it. This includes a full-range PA, cables, mics, DI boxes, and stage monitors. The expectation used to be a minimum of two monitor mixes, but these days I think the standard is a monitor mix per performer (including the caller!) up to at least 4-6 mixes. If this is important to you, check in about it.
Guests: most events allow a performer to bring a plus-one, and sometimes multiple guests. The event almost never covers their travel, but often provides free or discounted admission, and usually charges accommodations at cost (which might be zero).
Working hours: typically you're on stage for 7 to 9.5hr of dancing, plus maybe a workshop, for a total of 8.5-11hr. Performers vary a lot in stamina, so if an event wants something towards the high end here this is good to check in on.
Cancellation: this doesn't happen often, which means people don't think about it, and there can be a lot of friction and misunderstandings here. If the event cancels, they should reimburse the performer's non-refundable expenses, and if it's less than ~3 months out also cover pay. If the performer has to cancel (ex: double booked, family emergency) they should generally not expect any payment and may need to refund already-reimbursed travel, but organizations should try to be compassionate.
Sickness is very tricky. Traditionally, my impression is that performers would still do gigs if they were physically able to, even if they were quite sick. With COVID this has changed, where now dance organizations often say they don't want anyone to attend if sick. This is good in some ways, but dance organizations often don't really think through what it would mean if a performer woke up the day of their flight with a sore throat. I think what's customary today is for performers to communicate symptoms to the organizers, and if the organizers ask the performer not to come still pay the performer and reimburse non-refundable expenses.
Megaband: it's common for weekends with multiple bands to want to have a final session where they all play together. I find this is pretty high-variance: sometimes the bands gel well and it's really fun, other times they just have really different ideas of what makes good dance music and either band would have been better on their own. Occasionally, after talking with the other band, we've told organizers that we think this wouldn't go well with our particular combination.
Pay: since the event is covering the big expenses, you're essentially talking about what the performer will net from the event before taxes. I've shared some of my recent numbers here, though this is a place where especially in-demand performers are likely able to negotiate more.
Contracts: most of the time events don't do contracts. Instead, the contra dance world operates on reputation, keeping one's word, and trying to do the right thing. I do think contracts are great, if people are good at setting out what their expectations are clearly, but if you're bringing in lawyers they can get expensive, and my impression is the less formal system actually works well. It is good to be clear, though, and I hope this post is a resource for people in thinking through places where they might not be on the same page.
As I wrote above, this is definitely not how you have to structure your agreement and specifics can and should vary. If you want to agree on a flat fee for pay + travel, or even a flat fee for everything on this list, that's between the event and the performers. But I think this default deal is good to keep in mind, so you don't agree in principle and then realize this isn't going to work.
Thanks to Max Newman for reviewing a draft of this post.