joe’s hill (11. 378)

Via tmn circling back to this viral map of the island of Kiritmati and select toponyms of the Republic of Kiribati (Christmas Island, pronounced Kirimass after the Gilbertese phonology, quite a feat of exonymy) piqued our curiosity—especially the debunked detail, rumour that the government of the Micronesian nation was behind the original posting to draw attention which has nevertheless attracted a spike in interest and has helped its campaign to promote sustainable tourism for this paradise existentially threatened by sea-level rise. Just so you know, Paris is a former settlement with a coconut plantation named by priest Emmanuel Rougier who was homesick, also through a lease from the British named the village Londres (London, Ronton). Poland was named in honour of mechanic Stanisław Pełczyński who improved the island’s irrigation systems. The village of Banana, possibly conflated with the reef isle of Banaba, is of unknown etymology, but was designated such in 1962 when four thousand American military personnel were stationed there in support of Operation Dominic, a series of thirty-one multi-pronged nuclear tests carried out in response to the resumption of Soviet trials following the breach of an informal moratorium and the Bay of Pigs Invasion. It is near the international airport. The oldest and largest village of the island chain is Tabwakea, native for sea turtle be bestowed by Captain James Cook. The title refers to the highest point of the atoll, originally la Colline de Joe, a twelve metre elevation named after Joe English of Medford, Massachusetts, one of the supervisors of Rougier’s coconut farm.  Under US dominion as a claim of the Guano Islands Act from 1882, independence was granted in 1979 and ratified in 1983.

castaways (11. 303)

First airing on this day in 1942 on the BBC Forces station, conceived and originally hosted by presenter Roy Plomley (until his death in 1985) and still broadcast on a weekly basis—making it the longest running radio programme after the Grand Ole Opry which began in 1925—Desert Island Discs invites celebrities, politicians, scientists, journalists, authors and artists as guests to choose eight audio (originally gramophone) recordings, a book (castaways are automatically given a volume of the Complete Works of William Shakespeare and the Bible or other appropriate theological or philosophical text) and a single luxury item that they would wish to have should they find themselves marooned, talking about their lives, careers and reasons for the titles selected. Over the course of three thousand episodes, guests have included Eartha Kitt, Bing Crosby, David Attenborough, Dave Bruebeck, Alfred Hitchcock, Liberace, Alec Guinness, Julie Andrews, Sophie Tucker, Cilla Black, Marlene Dietrich, Harold Pinter, Anthony Burgess, Magnus Pyke, Lauren Bacall, Elia Kazan, Burl Ives (who selected the I Ching), Norman Mailer, Bob Geldof, Stephen Hawking, Brian Blessed, Stephen Sondheim, Stephen Fry, Debbie Harry and Zadie Smith. Over the decades, the most requested piece of music has been “Ode to Joy,” the last movement from Beethoven’s Ninth Symphony. Conceived with the sounds of crashing waves and the cries of seabirds as the introduction and conclusion, producers however insisted on “By the Sleepy Lagoon,” an instrumental by Eric Coates, composer of light music—see also.

synchronoptica

one year ago: School House Rock! at 50, Dr Strangelove plus assorted links to revisit

two years ago: more banned books, a Mozart opera, Axis of Evil, an AI creates bespoke colours plus more conspiratorial thinking

three years ago: an opera by Peter Josef von Lindpainter, more links to enjoy plus a digital demesne

four years ago: Mantra Rock Dance (1967), the Rubik’s Cube (1980) plus the Space Cat gets a monument

five years ago: the event that inspired Boomtown Rats, an excellent Rube Goldberg machine,  Sleeping Beauty (1959), a Trump attorney’s political thriller plus artist Javier Riera

castaway narrative (11. 016)

Coined in 1731 by author Johann Gottfried Schnabel in the preface of deserted island, survivalist story The Island Stronghold (Die Insel Felsenberg), the term robinsonade describes the genre wherein the protagonists find themselves shipwrecked and marooned and suddenly separated from civilisation, an homage to Daniel Defoe’s 1719 work Robinson Crusoe, and testament to proliferation of derivative works that followed, spanning decades and up to modern times. The most familiar being Johann David Wyss’ 1812 The Swiss Family Robinson in its various adaptations (theatrical produced in 1940 and again in 1960 and the sci-fi series Lost in Space—Danger Will Robinson!), the stranded group of immigrants were nameless in the book and is one of a number (at least two-hundred historic and contemporary examples) national and regional versions, like the Bohemian Robinsons, the Icelandic Robinsons and the Dutch Robinsons—with the conceit continuing. As primitive as can be.

9x9 (10. 984)

built on sand: UN monitoring reveals the alarming scale of marine dredging 

but the meteor men beg to differ, judging by the hole in the satellite picture: revisiting a cringey faux academic essay on “All Star” to realise that Steve Harwell (RIP) had more to tell us  

j-mouse: a procession of dead-end peripherals—I would get the PC in an ottoman 

⡆⠄: LEGO’s braille bricks offered free-of-charge to parents and educators now available to the general public 

the secret-sharer: a confessional box from Simone Giertz (previously) where one’s messages are only present for a few seconds before self-destructing  

phil a. o’fish: a short-lived McDonaldland mascot and early beef alternatives—via Weird Universe  

mixed media: experiential scale-models of Tracey Snelling inspired by the architecture of Berlin—including the Mäusebunker 

premeditatio malorum: fifty short rules for better living from the Stoics  

thermohaline circulation: scientist support using the oceans’ inclination for equilibrium to pull in excess atmospheric carbon-dioxide—see previously

 synchronoptica

one year ago:  Tainted Love (1981) plus assorted links to revisit

two years ago: a film from D W Griffith, armorial bearings plus the debut of the Muppet Show (1976)

three years ago: the opening of the Gotthard Tunnel (1980)

four years ago: the greenwashing of the recycling movement plus a legendary kingdom in Bretagne

five years ago: a Freddie Mercury birthday bash, a Queen arrangement in brass, outsider artist James Henry Pullen plus reconciling with the end of coal through art

9x9 (10. 752)

x-date: unless a compromise is found to work with the statutory debt ceiling, the US could default on paying its bills and unleash chaos in global financial markets 

the house of mouse: Disney is cancelling plans for a billion dollar Florida annex—and shuttering its immersive Star Wars experience resort hotel—in an ongoing feud with the state’s arch-conservative governor  

garbage patch kids: creepy dolls being washed ashore are auctioned off to benefit marine habitats—see also 

superimposition: researchers at the Zurich Institute of Technology create the world’s largest ‘Schrödinger’s Cat” 

the great silence: we are probably not alone in the Universe but we might as well be—see previously  

random access memory: previously unreleased tracks from retired duo Daft Punk  

interior design: browser-based application to create and share voxel rooms, via Waxy—see previously  

byte-dance: American state of Montana passes a ban of the social media platform TikTok over conflated fears of violations of users privacy  

seat at the table: G7 summit hosted in Hiroshima—with nuclear deterrence on the agenda

8x8 (10. 700)

a is for anarchist: a counter-culture abecedarium—see previously  

man o’war: thousands of by-the-wind-sailors (Vellela vellela) wash ashore in California  

runway-zero-one-left: views of random airport exteriors—via Pasa Bon!—see previously

manicule: Punctuation Personified: or, Pointing Made Easy (1824)—see also  

pepperoni hug spot: an AI made an intriguingly nightmarish TV commercial 

 jefferies tube: a survey of secret passages—including the ulitidors at Disneyland  

roaring forties: remote Gough Island is hiring 

yon zircle: final-born member of the Bowlin alphabet family passes away, aged 94

seashore—never more

Via Strange Company’s Weekend Link Dump, we learn that during his life time, Edgar Allen Poe’s most popular and best-selling work was the field guide “The Conchologist’s First Book.” In the 1830s, geology, due to the rising interest in coal as a fuel source, and its sister-science of conchology (see previously) were the hottest commodities as combined, it allowed one to expound on Earth’s history through studying successive strata, and Poe’s slim and portable contribution to the discipline was well-received and had the poetic and evocative subtitle: A System of Tesataceous Malacology—that is, the study of small, soft-bodied creatures by exhuming their hardened ruins. Though perhaps not the most expressive vehicle, some of the author’s flair and license does manage nonetheless to shine through. Much more to explore at the links above.

west coast sound

Through the biography of the once promising career of crooner Dane Donohue, the soi-disant lost prince of the genre, we find ourselves introduced to the classification of the very familiar broad musical category and aesthetic filed under Yacht Rock. This easy-listening, adult-contemporary playlist includes Christopher Cross’ emblematic song Sailing, Toto’s Rosanna, Poco, Santana, Steely Dan, REO Speedwagon and Donohue’s 1978 break-through hit Casablanca and focuses on themes exploring isolation, male loneliness and suburban mindsets—a significant departure from the protest anthems of the previous years and accidentally united by a class of performers who played into the genre. Learn more about Donohue and how his career as anthemic as it was was cut short at Narratively at the link up top.