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March 13, 2026Can you guess what’s pictured above? Click the image to find out! |
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Before I was the father of a boy with autism, I did not understand the appeal of the anti-vax movement. Yet being thrust into the world of parents of children on the spectrum means, especially on social media, being inundated by claims of vaccine injury. And it’s significantly worse in the second Trump era when parents desperate for something to blame for their child’s delays and differences are encouraged to ignore decades of science by those in charge of our national public health apparatus.
I’m more empathetic to anti-vaxxers than I used to be both because autism is an emotionally and financially draining beast and because I see why some parents think the shots their kids got at around two years old “changed” them. It’s a coincidence; autism becomes more apparent around that time in many cases because that’s when communication and other delays start to become obvious.
Most parents of autistic children can, if they allow themselves, spot clues and evidence in retrospect – our son’s incredible challenge figuring out how to suck on a straw and his utter obsession with storm drains were two that seemed mundane and unimportant at the time – but those who can’t or won’t do so find the idea that the inoculations did it comforting. Comfort is hard to come by when you’re wrangling a child like this. (It’s also possible that, as an adoptive parent, I don’t take it personally if something in his genetic makeup caused this.)
Still, I felt that old familiar anger at anti-vax promulgators again this week as I digested the news of the first two measles cases in Michigan being diagnosed in unvaccinated Washtenaw County residents. Health officials published a list of dates and times where those unvaccinated people visited various places, and one of them was the CVS in Ypsi where I believed my husband and son visited in the window of concern. It turns out, they were there at that time the day before, so there wasn’t anything to worry about.
Except that there was. Yeah, my kids are vaccinated. But they go to school and other places with children who are not for various reasons. We also have friends and family with babies too young to vaccinate. We may not have been around this particular infected person, but measles spreads pretty fast and easily so sooner or later we will be. Also, we’ve learned from Covid that vaccines aren’t 100 percent effective, so even immunized people can get sick.
Bottom line: The fact that we have to worry about something that modern science took very good care of already is an infuriating waste of time and human suffering.
Your news is here. ICE seems focused on Ypsi, U-M men’s basketball collected a passel of Big Ten honors as March Madness approaches, the term “cakewalk” is problematic, local inmates are being shipped across the state, and a recent U-M alum is raking in big bucks on Jeopardy!
This is last week’s most-clicked link.
– Steve Friess, editor
P.S. Looking for a March Madness pool to join? I run one! Last year, we had fifty entries! Email me by March 18 if you want to participate! |
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| | | Werkner Rd. near Chelsea, where residents are suing the Washtenaw County Road Commission to prevent the removal of these trees. Courtesy: Greg Johnson |
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State’s first 2026 measles cases confirmed here: An unvaccinated adult is believed to have contracted the disease on a recent trip to Florida and transmitted it to a “close contact,” according to a press release from the Washtenaw County Health Department. A spokesperson tells a2view the department is not specifying the original patient’s city, but she did say they have not been hospitalized. The press release lists several places around Ann Arbor, Ypsi and Canton that the infected person visited between March 4 and 8 and urges people who were also in those places around the same time to monitor themselves for three weeks. Worth noting for folks experiencing symptoms: “Do not seek medical treatment in person without calling the doctor’s office, urgent care, or emergency room first.” Anyone wanting to schedule a vaccination appointment can call (734) 544–6700 or visit 555 Towner in Ypsi as a walk-in on Tuesdays and Thursdays from 8:30 a.m. to 3:30 p.m. or Fridays from 8 a.m. to 3 p.m. |
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A2 Jews on alert as Shabbat approaches: The car attack Thursday morning on Temple Israel in West Bloomfield Twp. prompted AAPD to increase patrolling of local synagogues and the Jewish Community Center of Greater Ann Arbor, the Michigan Daily reports. Local shuls have been prepping for such an event even before the Temple Israel incident; on Wednesday, Temple Beth Emeth held an “active assailant” training for members that featured AAPD officers and, coincidentally, has a preplanned “building tour” tonight to show members the locations of exits and shelters in the event of an attack or weather crisis. The JCC emailed: “While it is a heartbreaking status quo, today’s violence underscores the importance of preparedness for Jewish organizations. Like many of our peer organizations, JFS of Washtenaw County is staying well looped in and adjusting safety and security protocols accordingly.” (Disclosure: I am a TBE member.) |
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Gelman Plume gets Superfund listing: The EPA yesterday named the creeping subterranean spread of the industrial toxin 1,4-dioxane as one of the nation’s “most contaminated sites,” according to a press release. This designation, long sought by Ann Arbor congresswoman Debbie Dingell, means that Gelman Sciences can be held “responsible for near- and long-term actions to more expeditiously address possible risks to human health and the environment.” Dingell celebrated the decision in an e-mailed press release, calling it “a major milestone for the Ann Arbor community.” Last month, the Observer reported that the plume had spread far enough from its Scio Twp. origin point that the Ann Arbor School District had decided not to install a planned geothermal energy system as part of its renovation of Slauson Middle School. |
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Ypsi bears the brunt of ICE activity: With more arrests popping into the news this week, MLive’s Samuel Dodge uses recent data to ask an excellent question – why is so much immigration enforcement in Washtenaw County centered around the Ypsilanti area? Ypsi’s population is one-sixth of Ann Arbor, but it has eight times the number of people arrested by ICE since the Trump crackdowns started. Yes, residents of Hispanic origin comprise a larger percentage of Ypsi’s population, but in raw numbers Ann Arbor’s Hispanic population is still almost four times as large. One of Dodge’s most interesting conjectures is that, per this New York Times piece, ICE seems to be focusing on smaller cities where officials aren’t as well-equipped to monitor their activity. It’s unlikely we’ll ever have an answer. |
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Sherrone walks: The fired U-M head coach pleaded no contest last Friday to two misdemeanors in exchange for dropping the felony charges surrounding his actions the day he lost his job, thus concluding the criminal portion of the saga. That doesn’t end the matter; an attorney of Paige Shiver, the assistant with whom Moore had an extramarital affair, says U-M still has much to answer for in terms of how it handled Shiver’s safety, among other matters. The next shoe to drop is likely to be the results of an external review being conducted to determine why it took so long to do anything about Moore’s relationship, which appears to have been an open secret. To understand just how big this story has become, note that the U.K.’s Daily Mail (!) is ruminating about whether Moore could return to coaching. |
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The guy with the hands: By day, Jacob Barr (above) works as a resident support specialist for Avalon Housing, but by night the twenty-eight-year-old uses his limb differences as source material for his stand-up comedy, Alex Kourvo writes for this month’s Ann Arborite profile. Barr has short forearms and unusually shaped hands as a result of VACTERL association, a congenital condition also known as VATER syndrome. “A big group of things is wrong with me,” he says cheerfully. “Most of it’s not a big deal. The individual parts are annoying, but my hands? They’ve only helped me. Everyone has things they’d change about themselves. Mine are just easier to notice.”
Two U-M spinouts offer creative power generation: Aquora Biosystems has tech to convert food waste, manure, sewage sludge, and byproducts from dairies and breweries into three crucial materials: methane, diesel, and jet fuel, while Heat2Power’s angle is turning excess heat from industrial processes into electricity. Cynthia Furlong Reynolds and Davi Napoleon tell both startups’ Ann Arbor backstories.
Poet Tree Town: Shannon Rae Daniels, a Cantonese American visual artist and writer, offers an evocative meditation on the seasons. “How did the trees learn to die deathlessly?” she ponders. |
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| The Wolverines beat Notre Dame in the quarterfinals of the Big Ten tournament this week. Courtesy: MGoBlue |
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Would someone please explain to me how U-M men’s hockey can be the No. 1–ranked team in the nation but only the No. 2 seed in the Big Ten tournament? Regardless, they play a semifinal in Ann Arbor tomorrow against Penn State.
Brackets for the women’s and men’s basketball tournaments will be out by the end of the weekend, but the No. 3–ranked U-M men’s squad is virtually guaranteed a No. 1 seed after it ended its regular season Sunday with a rousing home victory over MSU. It remains to be seen whether the women will get a No. 2 seed, which would be unprecedented for the program, after their lackluster loss on Saturday to Iowa in the Big Ten tournament.
The men’s squad, due to play today in its first round of the Big Ten tournament, loaded up on Big Ten awards this week. Dusty May is coach of the year, Yaxel Lendeborg is player of the year, and Aday Mara is defensive player of the year.
Meanwhile, EMU and its men’s basketball coach mutually agreed to part ways.
A former U-M assistant football coach fired in 2023 has filed a wrongful termination lawsuit. He was dismissed as part of the sign-stealing scandal, but the NCAA later cleared him of wrongdoing.
Who is James Denison? A Jeopardy! champ whose winnings topped $100,000 who recently got his PhD from U-M. In his third win, there was even a coincidental (and irrelevant) category called “UM.” Did he win his fifth game on Thursday? Spoiler.
A tornado slammed an A2 couple’s Union City vacation home.
Dzanc House is dropping a “cakewalk” from an upcoming Cake Carnival after learning about the racist origin of the activity (and commonly used phrase).
TEDx is here tomorrow. Look who’s talking.
Washtenaw County is paying $35 per person per day to send as many as twenty inmates to Ludington’s Mason County jail to alleviate overcrowding.
No Kings will stage its third nationwide anti-Trump day of protest on March 28 with events scheduled in Washtenaw County so far at Veterans Memorial Park, in downtown Ann Arbor, at the Ypsi Farmers Market, in Milan, in Whitmore Lake, in Chelsea, and in Saline.
Between February 24 and March 2, U-M surgeons transplanted eight livers in eight days including three within twelve hours. Let’s raise a (non-alcoholic!) glass to all involved!
Public art in Ann Arbor is not just for decoration, Concentrate writes.
Business after business has failed at 640 Packard St. Will the coming U-M dorm complex nearby turn that around? |
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“Collectivist” café opens: Espy Cafe, at 404 W. Huron St., is distinctive in its business structure, in which employees, who all make a base wage of $27.50 an hour, earn shares in the company based on the number of hours they work, the owners tell Dave Algase in this month’s Observer. The living wage model means higher menu prices, tempered by a no-tips policy. “Even as a customer, we’re sort of tip-fatigued,” says cofounder Peter Littlejohn (above with wife Julia Knowles). “So if everybody pays the fair share, then you don’t feel pressured to tip $3 on a $3 coffee.”
Good Soil Cafe still a go after visionary’s death: After the passing of Melvin Parson, the founder of We The People Opportunity Farm, entrepreneur Stewart Beal took to Facebook to promise to see Parson’s vision for the so-called “Cow Building” in Ypsi to become a coffee shop that helps formerly incarcerated people gain skills and employment. “While Melvin won’t be here to see it through, I am sure many other Ypsilanti community members, people who supported him and believed in his mission will help us pick up where he left off and see this through,” Beal writes. The public is invited, in fact, to help paint the statue of a cow standing on top of the low-slung building on Ecorse brown and white on May 3 from 1 to 4 p.m.
Van Buren Twp. smoothie bar to add Ypsi location: WhatNow Detroit reports that the owners of Haggerty Nutrition Cafe plan to open a store called Downtown Ypsi Nutrition at 56 N. Huron St. Owner Sebtein Aljaihawi tells the outlet the smoothie and juice bar should start serving in April. |
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Beloved drag performer set for weekend of fundraising performances: Jadein Black is celebrating her birthday with a brunch on Saturday at Sidetrack Bar & Grill to benefit Ann Arbor Pride followed by Drag Bingo at Tap Room to benefit public school music education programs. On Sunday, Black hosts another round of Drag Bingo at Tap Room, although the beneficiary is not specified.
EMU calls for donations to campus food pantry: The Stock Swoop’s Shelves Campaign seeks to replenish supplies amid a surge in demand, according to a social media post. It runs from March 16 to April 3; visit this link to learn how to give or make an online cash donation. Nearly half of EMU students face food insecurity, EMU says.
Wednesday is Giving Blueday: The annual twenty-four-hour event spurs a range of student groups and other U-M-affiliated organizations to raise money for a wide range of causes within the university universe. That includes a student emergency fund for the Taubman College of Architecture & Urban Planning, internship programs at the Clements Library, and scholarships at the Ford School, among many others. Last year’s Giving Blueday raised more than $4.6 million from 11,125 donors. |
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