It’s finally Friday. It’s the third Friday in February in a very cold and slushy February for Seattle.

We’ve been snowed in most of the week. We’re on track to have the one of the coldest Februaries on record. Our street is full of ice and slush that keeps refreezing every night.

Anyway, welcome to the Friday Five. This week I bring you: a special story of the week, the top five (IMHO) stories of the week, five stories about writing and reading, five stories about deplorable people, and five videos (plus a notable obituary and the things I’ve written).

Some stories are so awesome they deserve a heading to themselves:

My Wife and I Didn’t Tell Our Children About Her Cancer . Have some kleenex handy…

Stories of the Week:

Unclaimed Bodies From the Opioid Epidemic Are Crowding Morgues – No One Really Knows What to Do With All of America’s Unclaimed Corpses.

The Opportunity Rover and the Pain of Giving Up .

Plummeting insect numbers ‘threaten collapse of nature’ .

One Year After Parkland: First the Murder, Then the Robbery.

The Broken Hearts Club: Inside the making of the 2000 gay rom-com.

This week in Writing and Reading:

Charlie Jane Anders’ Ideas for Complex Characters of All Genders.

Oh No, She Didn’t: The Strong Female Character, Deconstructed.

‘Retcon’: How To Rewrite Details In An Ongoing Series.

An Easy Tip for Getting Unstuck in a Scene.

The Most Powerful Force – how John W. Campbell Jr. influenced and formed science fiction in the 1930s to 1950s and how the genre eventually grew beyond him.

Awful, Deplorable People:

The Wall Is in Their Hearts – “The wall is being built. It’ll continue. It’s going at a rapid pace.”.

20 years, 700 victims: Southern Baptist sexual abuse spreads as leaders resist reforms .

The most powerful moment of the Whitaker hearing had nothing to do with Mueller – Rep. Pramila Jayapal grilled the acting attorney general about family separation — and he had no answers.

Rep. Ilhan Omar Would Just Like To Know Which Massacre Elliott Abrams Is Proudest Of.

Texas Sec. Of State Apologizes For Bogus Voter List Upon Confirmation Vote Delay.

In Memoriam:

John Dingell Jr.: A Wonkpreciation!.

You’re Living in the America John Dingell Made. “There’s really nobody in America who isn’t impacted—often in ways they don’t understand—by his work in Washington.”

Patricia Nell Warren, The Front Runner Author, Dies at 82.

Patricia Nell Warren, Author of the Groundbreaking Gay Novel ‘The Front Runner’, Has Died at 82.

Author & all around wonderful woman Patricia Nell Warren finishes her race.

Paperback Pioneer Betty Ballantine Dead at 99.

Legendary editor and publisher Betty Ballantine (1919-2019).

RIP, Oppy the Mars Rover – After 15 years, the adventurous spacecraft has finally bit the dust..

Things I wrote:

Weekend Update 2/10/2019: Gruesome Killers and Unrepentant Ex-ex-gay Charlatans.

The unending struggle against thermal equilibrium, or, trying to get my coffee just right.

Definitely did not dodge the snow and ice.

Hate isn’t just a feeling: Attitudes and silence can cause as much harm as actions.

Videos!

Good Omens: Opening Title Sequence :

(If embedding doesn’t work, click here.)

The Real Black Panther – Black Leopard Spotted in Kenya:

(If embedding doesn’t work, click here.)

The Impossible Hugeness of Deep Time:

(If embedding doesn’t work, click here.)

Kacey Musgraves – Rainbow (Official Music Video):

(If embedding doesn’t work, click here.)

Ben Platt – “Ease My Mind” [Official Video]:

(If embedding doesn’t work, click here.)