@Jake
I write about drinks, public policy, and other vices in Portland, Oregon. Co-founder of Seabird, the app you're using right now!
www.jacobgrier.comReads far and wide — 117 sources in 90 days
Also a writer — 2 original pieces this quarter
Bad news: my writing career may never culminate in drinking daiquiris in my home in Key West.
Can Key West Still Be a Home for Writers?
Ernest Hemingway, Judy Blume and other literary luminaries have long called the island home. As housing costs increase, many locals are taking steps to preserve and perpetuate this legacy.
nytimes.com
A dispatch from Germany on the alarming rise of the AfD.
Germany's AfD Is Closer Than Ever to Power
How a country shaped by its fascist past is on the verge of watching the far-right party close in on control
theunpopulist.net
Australia's social media ban going about as well as its restrictions on e-cigarettes.
More than 80% of kids still using social media despite ban, new eSafety report finds
The report provides more evidence Australia’s world-leading social media ban isn’t going to plan.
theconversation.com
A good piece about not slipping into easy assumptions about "food deserts" and what people choose to eat.
The Myth of the Food Desert
The fight against “food deserts” assumes that better options lead to better diets. The evidence is thin.
newyorker.com
If you want to read something really sweet...
The adorable love story behind Wikipedia’s
Nearly 14 years later, the tale of this iconic couple can finally be told.
inverse.com
A new novel to add to my to-read list.
Why Animal Narrators Are All the Rage
A new novel helps explain why so many storytellers enlist animal narrators to explore humanity.
theatlantic.com
I'd seen a little about this previously, but this is a really good story on color perception and the scientific tricks used to let a very small number of people see a new color that doesn't exist in nature.
What Would It Mean to See a New Color?
A new color called olo can be described as the “greenest green.” It can never be captured by a camera, but its development tells us a lot about how vision works.
newyorker.com
Interesting article on how Instagram is affecting bands and music bookers, plus it taught me a he phrase to work into my writing when I want to find smart: mise en abyme.
Is the Internet panopticon going to ruin live music too? - Chicago Reader
Social media and streaming have changed who can book shows and how. Those new incentives might even convince a local band to play a hot-dog joint.
chicagoreader.com
Fall cookbook preview from Chronicle, including the new book from me and Brett Adams. Based on how much I enjoyed his previous book, I'm also looking forward to the latest from Nik Sharma.
Fall Cookbooks We're Crushing On
Plus, a Mochi Mommy recipe that's perfect for the end of summer 🍓
chroniclecooks.substack.com
I have a higher spice tolerance than a typical Portlander, but I would not attempt this.
Inside the searing, strangely wholesome world of competitive chilli…
Red hot — Exploding out of pandemic-era isolation, a growing community of chilliheads are competing across the globe, devouring millions of Scoville units…
huckmag.com
While Portland debates minor upgrades to the Moda Center, a look at how new stadiums are breaking the boring mold of recent decades. The Birmingham one is pretty wild. Not much discussion here of who's paying...
dezeen.com
Take a look at these Bozos.
Pittsburgh sends in the clowns
Pittsburgh adds to a growing national fascination with clowns that brings the performers back to their inventive, playful, often subversive roots.
pghcitypaper.com
If you're wondering why people you know are still making mad Facebook posts about Anthony Fauci in the year 2026, here's the background on that. (Any visit to Facebook makes me instantly grateful for the crew of smart posters here on Seabird!)
The Unmaking of Anthony Fauci
He built an empire. It did not last.
theatlantic.com
Nodding vigorously along with this as I'm into my third month of being sidelined from futsal with a sprained ankle.
When Did You Stop Playing Sports? It Matters.
There's a certain age most Americans call it quits. But the longer you delay, the longer you live.
insidehook.com
A view from Canada seeing the US government more clearly than Americans do from home.
Opinion | ‘You Aren’t Going to Like What Comes After America’
Remember when ‘blame Canada’ was a joke?
nytimes.com
A throwback to the state of cocktail culture when I took up bartending.
You Again! The Return of the Japanese Hard Shake
How one of cocktail culture's past obsessions resurfaced unexpectedly at Tales of the Cocktail
thelongbar.substack.com
This makes a pretty convincing case that the number of trans people being compelled to migrate in the US lately is an underreported story.
The American Transgender Refugee Crisis
If this were occurring abroad, to an ethnic minority, we would call it ethnic cleansing.
liberalcurrents.com
Long, thoughtful piece on whether non-stick pans should stick around and why the writer can't recommend ceramic alternatives.
It’s Time to Give Up on the Nonstick Pan as We Know It
A Wirecutter kitchen writer spent weeks testing ceramic nonstick pans made without PFAS. They ended up wanting to move on from nonstick cookware for good.
nytimes.com
When you have an opportunity to take in a longer journalistic read this week, this is worth your time.
The Rosenberg Boys
When Ethel and Julius Rosenberg were executed by the U.S. government, they left behind two sons, ages 6 and 10. All these years later, Robby and Michael are still trying to make sense of what happened.
theatlantic.com
Advice for writing by hand from Neil Stephenson. I think my hand-writing is too far gone to take this up any time soon, but he sure make this sound appealing.
Writing by Hand is Good for your Brain - Here's how to do it
Because I am known to write using a fountain pen on paper, a number of people have pointed me to this post and its underlying research. I won’t rehash what is said in those sources, but the gist of it is that when you write things down by hand you’re recruiting more of your brain, which is a good thing.
nealstephenson.substack.com
Interesting case to be aware of, especially if you've thought about putting a duress password on your phone.
US accuses American of allegedly wiping his phone using a 'duress' password during border search | TechCrunch
A U.S. citizen has asked a court to throw out the government's claim that he gave over a passcode to border authorities that wiped his phone's data, opening up fresh questions about a person's constitutional rights at the U.S. border.
techcrunch.com
Possibly driven by AI, an apparent rise in solo businesses forming and operating successfully.
The age of the solopreneur
More solo founders, growing faster, powered by AI
stripeeconomics.com
Not the typical opening for a NYT article: "I’ve had a hand in killing around six people. Maybe seven. I don’t know if one man bled out on the side of the road or was taken to a doctor. I think about him often."
Why I Sought Out a Taliban Commander I Had Fought
First as a Marine and then as a journalist, I spent years tied to Afghanistan. I returned one last time to speak to a former enemy in search of answers, and perhaps closure.
nytimes.com
Endorsed! The Arsenic and Old Lace (aka an Attention or Atty) is an underrated cocktail.
This Prohibition-Era Martini Is Winning Over Absinthe Skeptics
The Arsenic and Old Lace, a gin Martini made with absinthe and crème de violette, makes a comeback at the Denver bar Nocturne.
punchdrink.com
I predict that the trajectory of Waymo in Portland will be a lot like Uber's, albeit more by the book: lots of handwringing before and as it happens, followed by obvious improvement that will leave hardly anyone longing for the status quo ante.
Self-Driving Taxi Service Waymo Begins Mapping Portland Streets
Right now, the robotaxis are simply learning Portland’s streets. Then what?
pdxmonthly.com
This is a really interesting piece on finding an early analague to the distruptions of AI in an unlikely event, the invention of mechanized cotton picking.
Rust and Boll
Anthropic should learn from those cotton-picking socialists.
asteriskmag.com
A brief tour of life at the most inhospitable parts of the Earth.
The Organisms That Make Earth’s Harshest Places Home | Quanta Magazine
Extremophiles that thrive in the most unforgiving environments aren’t just biological curiosities. Understanding their resilience has many implications for us.
quantamagazine.org
On tech giants and reactionary futurism, "the deployment of science-fiction aesthetics to advance anti-democratic political projects".
Vercel Security Checkpoint
aeon.co
Interesting short piece on the different approaches to prison in Norway and the US, the former treating the country's most reviled mass murderer more humanely than America treats some immigrants living their lives peacefully without the proper paperwork.
15 Years Ago, Anders Breivik Massacred 77 People. Norway Is Determined to Treat Him Humanely.
Our prisons, ourselves.
thenation.com
The libs are getting the Odyssey in the national divorce.
Christopher Nolan vs. the Chuds
Christopher Nolan’s Odyssey is a massive hit — and nearly everyone on the Right, from Elon Musk to the Daily Wire, is furious. Because what 21st-century conservatives really want is a profound cheapening of the Western civilization they claim to revere.
jacobin.com
I'm not inherently opposed to forced quarantine when circumstances justify it, but man, the government sure could have treated these people a lot better if it's going to subject them to this.
The Ordeal of a 42-Day Hantavirus Quarantine: ‘I Felt Like a Prisoner’
Eighteen Americans were isolated for weeks in a Nebraska quarantine facility after being exposed to the deadly virus on a cruise ship. Many found the experience traumatic.
nytimes.com
A visit to one of Florida's classic weird tourist attractions.
The real life mermaids of Florida’s Weeki Wachee Springs
Old Florida — A relic of pre-Disney tourism in the state, the show – which sees women perform athletic underwater tricks in a natural spring – has been…
huckmag.com
The writer has an obvious axe to grind here, so I would take some of these evaluations with a grain of salt. But it's nonetheless an interesting read on who owns various cookware brands and if they're still any good.
Your Cookware Got Worse On Purpose
One buyout firm quietly collected Pyrex, Corelle, Instant Pot, and Oneida. Farberware is a name on a 200-year lease. And the pans still worth buying.
worseonpurpose.com
Tacofredag, an admirable tradition to be sure.
How tacos became Norway's national comfort food
An oil boom, a supermarket opportunity and decades of adaptation transformed the taco from a Tex-Mex import into one of Norway's most beloved traditions.
bbc.com
I've posted a few articles about the decline of reading, so here's a counterpoint from the always thoughtful David Wallace-Wells.
Opinion | Is This What a Post-Literate Era Looks Like?
It’s not the children who stopped reading. It’s their grandparents.
nytimes.com
Sports! Get your sports! A thoughtful sendoff for the World Cup as a whole, not just the final match.
Method Beats Madness at the World Cup Final
In the World Cup final, Spain stood for Europe, the industrial heart of modern soccer, while Argentina, a great but flawed team, was fuelled by myth.
newyorker.com
A balanced take on data centers and water use.
The Truth About AI’s Water Use
It’s complicated—and it might not matter that much.
theatlantic.com
In case you've ever wondered what it's like to volunteer as a victim in a simulated mass casualty event.
Disaster Rehearsal | Morley Musick
At 7 AM on a Saturday in September 2025, I participated in a mass-casualty simulation drill held in the firefighter training area of O’Hare International Airport.
nplusonemag.com
I'm open to trying these, but consider me skeptical of low-abv spirits holding up to the standard strength kind (aside from herbal and bitter liqueurs, which are already often lower proof). A couple Portland mentions in this story.
It’s Possible to Drink All Night and Wake Up Feeling Like You’re 25 Again. You Just Need to Make One Easy Substitution.
In this case, less is definitely more.
slate.com
I want to see the Odyssey in IMAX, but this is a fun post pushing back against the idea that that's the only way to properly watch it.
The anti-IMAX populist backlash | Read Max
Greetings from Read Max HQ! You're reading Read Max, a twice-weekly newsletter guide to the present, the future, and sometimes the past. Tod
patreon.com
Josh Barro against permanent DST.
Permanent Daylight Saving Time Is the Perfect Stupid Idea for Our Stupid Time
Whiny people who don't know history are failing to acknowledge trade-offs. That's just how politics is now.
joshbarro.com
Virginia Postrel on Amsterdam's innovative contributions to firefighting.
How Amsterdam invented the fire department - Works in Progress Magazine
Two Dutch brothers invented a system that transformed a city previously ravaged by fires
worksinprogress.co
An entertaining case for abolishing VAR before it helps kill the experience of watching soccer.
VAR Is My Mortal Enemy and Should Be Yours, Too
The 2026 World Cup has been astonishingly good, with one nightmarish exception
theringer.com
In the future, everyone will have an AI-written biography about them for sale on Amazon. (The guy interviewed here, making 10 AI books a week on Amazon's print-on-demand service, is definitely getting a better return than I have actually writing books on the same platform.)
I Got Slopped
Someone used A.I. to write my biography. Thousands more of those books are polluting Amazon. Who is behind all this drivel?
nytimes.com
An ode to lichens, specifically the varieties in the Pacific Northwest.
They’ve puzzled scientists for more than a century — and they’re almost everywhere in WA
More than 1,000 species of lichen grow in Washington. All of them offer a window into profound biological cooperation.
seattletimes.com
A brief history of the undo button.
The undo button has redone who we are
How Undo, a supposedly simple, now ubiquitous keyboard function reshaped how we think about decision-making, permanence, and the nature of choice.
mercury.com
My former classmate reports on how our college has transformed itself in the past couple decades.
How Vandy Bested the Ivies
With the opening of its NYC campus, the school’s ascent to elite status seems complete.
nymag.com
A smart piece on stupidity. "Novelists have long understood the intelligence-stupidity relationship with a clarity that most scientists choose to ignore. Perhaps because fiction can show the process by which an intelligence can devour itself, a rather unpalatable spectacle to a rationalist."
What Makes Humans Stupid
What Makes Humans Stupid: It takes intelligence to get things spectacularly wrong. An essay on our undoing.
nautil.us
This article nods briefly to the fact that despite this "trend," smoking rates are still very low by historic standards. The interesting takeaway for me here is that acknowledgment that smoking is (for many people, at least) genuinely fun. The denial of this has misguided experts in tobacco control for a long time, leading them to overestimate the ease of prohibition.
Cigarettes are back in vogue. How did this happen?
Celebrities like Dua Lipa and Gracie Abrams have been photographed with cigs, as have social media influencers who like the retro vibes.
washingtonpost.com
The only line I'd disagree with here is that "[every]social media platform is awful." You all make Seabird pretty great!
Graham Platner Was the Perfect Twitter Candidate
Social media transformed his campaign into a political mirage.
slate.com
