Headlines from December 19, 2011

Of drone pilots, 30% suffer high levels of stress—though not dangerous levels, the Air Force says.
The differences between your debt and American Airlines’s.
Analysis of how much money top chess players can make.
Reasonably easy math on how tidal power—virtually inexhaustible and less intermittent than solar/wind—can be harnessed.
“Brick bending”—how to build round things out of rectangular Lego blocks.
Go to Vegas “with my girls.” A reverse bucket list, or, “Things I never want to do before I die.”
Should your day be going shitty: a button to make everything OK.
Former Michigan factory town tries to revive itself with a Jack Nicklaus-designed golf course. #longreads
The shortest short story is a photograph, like Leibovitz’s bicycle picture “Sarajevo.”
Estimates of the U.S. autism rate have climbed twentyfold—but instead of an epidemic, we simply may have better reporting. via
Scientists figure out what people really mean when they claim to like “anything but country.”
David Fincher breaks down a four-minute sequence from Dragon Tattoo.
It was during the final Saturday event before Christmas that I became, though only for a few minutes, a transcendent Santa. Life of a Saks Santa.
David Bowie visits Bing Crosby during the holidays to sing a duet of two Christmas classics. #video
Will Ferrell visits John C. Reilly during the holidays to sing a duet of two Christmas classics.
Related tip for lovely Christmas parties: Don’t ask other guests, “Do you know who you look like?”
Tributes flow in after Sunday’s death of Vaclav Havel, playwright and president.
Related: Remnick’s profile as Havel left power, in a tailored suit rather than borrowed trousers. #longreads
Kim Jong-il’s death announced by weepy Korean newscaster.
While his country suffered, Kim Jong-il realized his family’s dream: to win at nuclear chess.
Oldie but goodie: “I was Kim Jong-Il’s cook.”
Slightly more inequality found in the U.S. than in the Roman Empire.
Egypt’s newest protest symbol, worn with respect: the eyepatch.
Deft overview of mafia and state powers intermingling in Russia finds “gradations of respect” in different types of assassination.
Notes on powers ascribed to fathers from the Napoleonic Code.
Young black man in New York City: Why is the NYPD after me?
Poor man’s text in India is the missed call—ring once, hang up—and it’s a massive phenomenon.
NYT mag staff: “[Paul Ford’s TMN story] provoked as much conversation in our office as any single story this year.”
Related: “The Age of Mechanical Reproduction,” by Paul Ford.
Disloyalty cards in Singapore support an ecosystem of cafés.
Drooly descriptions of Tokyo’s coffee bars (“Drooly? Yes.”—ed.)
Continuing the Russo/Manjoo fight, a cheer for bookstores’ variety of titles.
By purchasing a hardcover book, you’re doing more than buying a pricey title—you’re telling the publisher to continue printing your favorite author. #opinions
Anthony Doerr’s favorite science books.
Obit for George Whitman, proprietor of Paris’s Shakespeare and Company, who cut his hair with fire.
To read while you eat lunch: On robots, drones, spies, ethics, war.