I like to start on a new notebook on New Year’s Day. It’s symbolic both of a fresh start and a clean slate. Or scraped tablet as the phrase “tabula rasa” translates to, describing the process by which wax tablets of old were reused, blanked by scraping off the writing. I love that idea, like shedding yourself of preconceptions to imbibe something new.
I keep several notebooks for different uses: reading and research notes, project logs and ideas, article drafts, and musings.
BLANK SLATE. Opening the Atlas Obscura Explorer’s Journal to start taking notes on New Year’s Day.
I’ve long wanted to own this Atlas Obscura notebook. I’m a fan of the site and one of its founders – the writer Joshua Foer. In the course of writing his wonderful book Moonwalking with Einstein, he won the US Memory Championship.
But I could only find the Atlas Obscura Explorer’s Journal online and at considerable cost for a notebook. I’d rather splurge on locally crafted leather journals.
ON SALE. Bought these Atlas Obscura Explorer’s Journal from Book Sale branches in Cebu City.
It turned out several journals were (take note of the tense, I bought everything I could get my hands on that day) available in Book Sale for a fraction of the original price. After a quick side trip from yearend engagements, I got my haul. Some I set aside to give away, others I reserved for my use.
Today I opened one, wrote my name and contact details on the first page and jotted down my first written notes of 2021.
This was expected but it’s fascinating to see actual data. Google Mobility Data showed how residents of Metro Cebu rushed to Groceries and Pharmacies with visits hitting 19 percent higher than the baseline figures of January 2020.
It was the only time that visits to Groceries and Pharmacies – or to any location outside the home – in Metro Cebu exceeded the baseline. Other urban centers in the Philippines logged visits to groceries higher than the baseline several days in mid-December leading to Christmas Eve.
Mobility data in Metro Cebu
(The graph below is interactive. You can use the search field to drill down to specific locations)
On Dec. 23, data showed spikes in visits to Parks (which covers beaches) at just -7%, the highest since before our strict quarantine lockdowns. On the same day, visits to Retail and Recreation (which also covers restaurant visits) hit -14 percent, also the highest recovery since before lockdowns.
Visits to Workplaces, on the other hand, hit the highest recovery compared to baseline on Dec. 19 at -10%. That figure was the highest since before the strict lockdowns. What does it show? Does it indicate a rush to the office to get something in preparation for the long break? Or does it indicate people going to the office for Christmas gatherings?
Data for Residential locations, on the other hand, showed the highest percentage rise compared with baseline but not by much. It’s not a significant increase compared with recent months, even during the strict lockdowns.
The data is gathered from users of Google Maps. The changes are calculated by Google “using the same kind of aggregated and anonymized data used to show popular times for places in Google Maps.”
It was made available by Google to help inform governments and institutions in the fight against COVID-19.
For a country known for its early and long Christmas celebration, the Philippines saw people in urban areas returning to groceries in mid-December in numbers not seen before quarantine lockdowns in the first quarter of 2020.
Bacolod recorded the highest percentage recovery on December 19 at +26% of visits to Groceries and Pharmacies, according to mobility data gathered by Google. This means that visits to these locations were even higher compared to the baseline period taken in January 2020.
Visits to Groceries and Pharmacies in PH urban areas
Other urban areas that have recorded visits in higher percentages compared with the baseline are Pampanga at +21% on December 20, Metro Manila at +15% on December 20, Cagayan de Oro at +11% on December 19, Davao City at +10% on December 19. Iloilo City matched the baseline of Groceries and Pharmacies visit on December 16.
Metro Cebu’s highest percentage recovery is at -2% on December 20. Baguio City is still way down, logging only a -13% on December 17 as its highest recovery. This means that for these two urban areas, visits to Groceries and Pharmacies still have not exceeded those recorded during the baseline period in January 2020.
Visits to Groceries & Pharmacies in different urban centers
Only visits to Groceries and Pharmacies have recovered in terms of percentages to match or even exceed the visits before the quarantine. The other locations Retail and Recreation (which covers restaurants), Parks (which includes beaches), Transit Stations, Workplaces are still substantially down compared with the baseline.
The data is gathered from users of Google Maps. The changes are calculated by Google “using the same kind of aggregated and anonymized data used to show popular times for places in Google Maps.”
It was made available by Google to help inform governments and institutions in the fight against COVID-19.
I love how the New York Times displays its bylines. It comes with a photo of the author. Apart from looking good on the screen, a photo byline makes the reader “feel they know the reporter better,” according to a study by the Center for Media Engagement at the University of Texas. While the study said it does not increase trust or engagement on the article, that should still count for something, no? It’s easy to duplicate this on WordPress. Its open source and community-developed nature allows anyone to tweak how their site looks or functions just by referring to the extensive documentation maintained by its global network of users.
Photo byline at the New York Times.
To duplicate the photo byline, one needs to 1) sign up for a Gravatar (short for globally-recognized avatar), 2) edit theme files, 3) tweak the CSS to control the design. Gravatar.com is a service started by Automattic, the company behind WordPress. What it does is designate an avatar to display, when configured, in web forums and comment forms, based on the poster’s email address. Make sure that all your site users have a Gravatar. It’s just a matter of signing up and choosing an image.
The next step is to edit the theme files. Look for The Loop, the part of the template that displays content. If you decide to use the beautiful and new default theme Twenty Twenty-One, it is located in Template Parts > Content > content-single.php.
The byline code should be placed after <?php the_title(); ?> which prints the title and before <?php the_content(); ?>, which displays the article text. In Twenty Twenty-One, it should be before <?php twenty_twenty_one_post_thumbnail(); ?>.
I use this to render the byline: <h3><?php echo get_avatar( get_the_author_meta( ‘ID’ ), ’85’ ); ?> By <?php the_author_posts_link(); ?></h3>. What this line of code does is render the byline in level 3 heading (h3) and link the name to a page listing previous articles by the author.
On print, a byline is a reward for good work and great writing. To get a print byline is a cause for celebration. Online, however, a byline provides reader added context – through a short bio, listing of previous stories, and a link to the author’s social media accounts. All these will allow the reader to examine an author’s body of work for bias and competence.
Using a photo byline in our WordPress-powered website on Cebu.
The last thing to do in WordPress is to style the photo byline. If you only do the steps above, you will get a square photo displayed on top of the author name. To display a round avatar and have the byline displayed beside it, edit your CSS by going to Appearance > Customize in the WordPress admin. Add the code below:
Apple has just announced the iPhone SE, a revamped version of its 4-inch iPhone 5 with a combination of powerful specs and features from its iPhone 6th generation line-up. If you haven’t had the chance to watch the official launch of the iPhone SE earlier, you might want to check out our video highlighting all the goodness of “the most powerful 4-inch smartphone ever!”.
Here are more related stories from Apple’s March 21 event:
