Theres a show on Netflix thats like The Great British Baking Show, but its about flowers and called The Big Flower Fight. I havent seen it yet but it apparently features this giant orangutan made of grass.
There's a show on Netflix that's like The Great British Baking Show, but it's about flowers and called The Big Flower Fight. I haven't seen it yet but it apparently features this giant orangutan made of grass. Netflix

Another reason to mask up: A very new study has found that surgical masks can reduce the spread of COVID-19 by up to 75%.

Sanders says chill out to his delegates, who might be big meanies to Team Biden. The news comes from the Washington Post, which writes:

The Vermont senator’s campaign has told some supporters picked to represent him this year to sign agreements barring attacks on other candidates or party leaders, combative confrontations on social media or talking to reporters without approval.

The move, which carried a threat of being removed as a delegate, has the effect of blunting one of the most powerful if divisive tools of Sanders’s movement—its unrestrained online presence and tendency to stoke controversy through other media, which has at times spiraled into abuse of his opponents, perceived and real.

Here's that nondisparagement agreement that the Sanders team is having delegates sign.

Starbucks asked for rent breaks from their landlords. The response? “I am highly disappointed, disgusted, and angry. Shame on you.” Solidarity, Starbucks.

Will we get fireworks this year? We didn't get fireworks at New Year's, and now it looks like we won't get fireworks on the 4th of July. Seafair is canceling its major events this summer, including "the July 4th celebration at Gas Works Park and Lake Union Park, the Milk Carton Derby, the Seafair Triathlon, Torchlight Run, Torchlight Parade, and Seafair Weekend Festival."

Seattle magazine says they are taking an indefinite break: "Sadly, Seattle magazine won’t be publishing a June issue, which would have needed to be written, photographed and sent to the printer in late April. None of that was possible under our current shelter-in-place model," wrote Seattle magazine's Chelsea Lin in a post published yesterday. "In fact, Seattle magazine’s staff has been furloughed while we figure out how and when to make our next issue. Subscribers, don’t worry: You’ll receive the 12 total issues of the magazine you’ve paid for." GeekWire founder Jonathan Sposato acquired Seattle magazine back in March after its old publisher, Minnesota-based Tiger Oak Media, filed for bankruptcy.

Michael Cohen will most likely serve the rest of his three-year prison sentence from home due to the coronavirus, reports the Wall Street Journal. Cozy!

Trump says he'll finish his hydroxychloroquine regimen in "about two days." The president said on Monday that he had been taking the controversial antimalarial drug for "about a week and a half" as a preventative measure after VP Mike Pence’s Press Secretary Katie Miller tested positive for COVID-19. Pence has said he's not taking hydroxychloroquine. The FDA doesn't want you to take hydroxychloroquine unless you are prescribed hydroxychloroquine.

Amazon dropped its first original big-budget video game today: Called Crucible, the game is a first-person free-to-play online shooter that's available for Windows 10. "Amazon acquired Twitch in 2014 for nearly $1 billion and established Amazon Game Studios eight years ago, but hasn’t launched many original titles and ran into several hiccups with canceled projects and layoffs," notes Geekwire.

Their next game in development is: New World, which is expected in August.

Analysis from Bloomberg:

If the first two titles are well received, Amazon’s gaming division could attract talent and shed a reputation for fits and starts. Popular games could also help build momentum for the company’s widely expected launch of a game-streaming service to rival Google Stadia, which lets users play a bunch games from any compatible device, without needing to download or update them. “There is much riding on the success of Crucible and New World,” says Billy Pidgeon, an analyst at Go Play Research.

Black Americans are dying from COVID-19 at a disproportionately high rate, according to a Washington Post analysis: "Counties that are majority-black have three times the rate of infections and almost six times the rate of deaths as counties where white residents are in the majority."

A new fear lurking in office toilet bowls: The bacteria that can cause Legionnaires’ disease. The monthslong stagnation of plumbing water in office buildings is causing some building managers to worry. “We haven’t really done studies on monthslong stagnation,” a doctor told the New York Times. “The ecological system may change. So while we’re looking at these organisms, maybe other organisms pop up.”

Someone tell Seattle: Portland just passed a measure to tax its wealthiest residents and biggest businesses, in the middle of a pandemic, to raise $2.5 billion over a decade to address homelessness. Meanwhile, in the Emerald City, we're quibbling over whether or not it's a big deal that Councilmember Lisa Herbold can't tell if constituents are nodding or booing over Zoom.

Since you probably missed Spring maybe try checking out this weird Netflix hybrid about gigantic floral structures. It's soothing, apparently. "The cadence is instantly recognizable, and therefore comforting: the contestants all genuinely like each other and sail through each episode by the skin of their teeth," writes Jezebel. I might check it out tonight, but I'm not sure how much twee* my heart can handle.

*Stranger's Rich Smith has been watching and says: "It's not really twee, it's like...watching a competition between different brands of Instagram influencers." And he called it "lively but empty, but it scratches an itch for seeing megafauna that is also megaflora that I could not possibly know I had." Honestly, I just miss seeing plants.