Britney Spears, the Princess of Pop, is the only perfect anagram of Presbyterians, a mainline American Protestant denomination. Although Ms Spears never to my knowledge took the occasion to employ this anagrammatisation as a pseudonym like Jim Morrison did in the Doors song “LA Woman” as Mr Mojo Risin, born this day—coincidentally—in Mississippi in 1981, she was born into a milieu of socially conservative evangelicalism and quickly retreated from those influences.
Friday, 2 December 2022
jeremy’s hammer? (10. 355)
catagories: ๐ถ, 1981, language, The Simpsons
Wednesday, 2 November 2022
oh, no! it’s devo (10. 264)


catagories: ๐ถ, networking and blogging, The Simpsons
Friday, 15 April 2022
7x7
who’s in your wallet: personalities and personages on banknotes—via Waxy (who is turning twenty)
simoom: a decade of dust storms

found photos: saved from oblivion and shared—via Things Magazine (plus a lot more to check out)
alphabet truck: the whole ABCs on the backside of lorries captured by Eric Tabuchi—via Pasa Bon!
meme-maker: Dutch national library offers a tool to scour medieval illustrations and marginalia—see also here and here
the colour of money: a survey of banknote hues from the archives
catagories: ๐ช, ๐ถ, ๐ฑ, ๐, ๐ท, libraries and museums, Middle Ages, Middle East, The Simpsons
Wednesday, 16 February 2022
the simpsons sing the blues
The first cartoon ensemble to reach the top spot on the singles charts since the Archies’ fabricated band’s performance of “Sugar, Sugar” back in 1969, on this day in 1991 the song “Do the Bartman” from the titular album grabbed and held the number one position. Never officially released as a single in the US despite air-play, the song written and produced by Michael Jackson earned critical acclaim including a nomination for the year’s MTV Video Music Awards. Track listings included several remixes including a cappella and a So So Krispy version by artist Diplo.
catagories: ๐️, ๐ถ, 1991, The Simpsons
Sunday, 30 January 2022
supernintendo chalmers
Via Kokatu we discover that a clever programmer has turned the segment from 1996’s “22 Short Films About Springfield” (a reference to the biopic Thirty-Two Short Films About Glenn Gould from 1993) wherein Principal Skinner invites his boss over for lunch, proceeds to ruin the meal and tries to convince Superintendent Chalmers that burgers are called “steamed hams” in upstate New York into a graphic adventure. Download the game or view the playthrough at the links above, which include more detail on the episode, the meme it inspired and other fan-made Simpsons arcade games.
catagories: ๐พ, ๐บ, The Simpsons
Thursday, 25 November 2021
7x7
brickover: iconic album covers recreated in LEGO from Pasa Bon’s curious links
sand castles: an innovative intervention to counter desertification
all about photos: arresting, colourful best-in-show exhibits from the AAP annual competition—via Kottkeno one listens to cassandra: rediscovering a 1997 article on what could go wrong in the twenty-first century that’s eerily prescient
parks & rec: a huge collection of vintage outdoor living catalogues and magazines—via the morning news
what—it’s not magaggie’s birthday: an unauthorised Simpson’s cookbook
spin-cycle: a gorgeous, inviting laundrette outfitted by Yinka Ilori and LEGO
Sunday, 31 October 2021
meine propositiones
According to most sources, Augustinian monk Martin Luther (see previously here, here and here—not a fave, just problematic), upset with leadership in the Catholic Church—chiefly over the indulgences racket—posted his Ninety-Five Theses to the door of the Wittenberg Palace Church of All Saints on this day in 1517, setting off the Reformation Movement in Germany.
catagories: ๐ฉ๐ช, ✝️, ๐ , revolution, Saxony, The Simpsons
Saturday, 28 August 2021
8x8
letraset press: a collection of instant lettering dry-transfer sheets (see previously) from Coudal Partners’ Fresh Signals
the woman who stared at the sun: the circumstance and contributions to astronomy of Hisako Koyama who helped hone our understanding of solar cycles
a good walk spoiled: an in-depth look at how golf course exacerbate the housing shortagecouch gag: a clever individual shares their construction of a miniature replica of the Simpsons’ purple television set that plays random episodes
one week supply: a podcast discussing Damn Interesting’s curated links section
the china syndrome: a super-tunnel simulator that illustrates the quickest, shortest routes to connecting points around the globe—see also
tartu snail tower: the spiralling skyscraper in Estonia’s second city
the art of letters: a typographical study from Mark Gowing
Tuesday, 15 June 2021
the rashomon effect
Via friend of the blog Nag on the Lake, we are introduced to eponymous phenomenon named after the one of the greatest films ever made in Akira Kurosawa’s 1950 masterpiece, based on Ryunosuke Akutagawa’s short story “In a Grove.” The framing narrative has various relatable, archetypal characters whose contradicting testimony speak to the inherent unreliability of eyewitness accounts (see also) and the malleability of memory, clouded by motive, mechanism, interpretation and the act of remembering itself changes a memory. Much more to explore at the link up top.
catagories: ๐ฏ๐ต, ๐ฌ, ๐, ๐ง , The Simpsons
Wednesday, 17 March 2021
hypospray or mister x
Via Waxy, here’s a nice survey of jabs and vaccination campaigns as portrayed in film and television, including classics like the Star Trek TOS episode Miri, biopics of Louis Pasteur and Edward Jenner, and a multiplicity of Simpsons episodes like the December of 2000 show “The Computer Wore Menace Shoes” wherein Homer’s alter ego creates a conspiracy website (after his first, innocent attempt failed to draw interest) that unfortunately speaks across the decades. As punishment for being too clever, Homer is imprisoned on an island for people who know too much. Seriously, get your shot and protect yourself and others.
Monday, 22 February 2021
like chalk and cheese
Though attested since the late fourteenth century and surely encountered in every day speech, we were unaware of this delightful idiom, said of things that are superficially alike but very different in substance, like a crumbly, unaged cheese that’s never mistaken as flaking chalk (though some attribute the etymology to an unscrupulous cheesemonger that tried to pass off adulterated product). The Turkish equivalent Daฤlar kadar farklฤฑ, “As different as the mountains” conveys the same sense. Its extended meaning covers things that don’t pair well. Learn more at Nag on the Lake at the link up top.
catagories: ๐ฌ๐ง, ๐น๐ท, ๐ง, language, The Simpsons
Wednesday, 10 February 2021
couch gag
In a highly satisfying sequence, story-teller and filmmaker Matthew Highton recreates the title opener to The Simpsons, indelible as it is, using carefully selected and synchronised stock footage. We agree that this clever compilation ought to be used one time instead of the animated version
catagories: ๐บ, The Simpsons
Thursday, 4 February 2021
¡ay caramba!

catagories: ๐บ๐ธ, The Simpsons
Saturday, 26 December 2020
8x8
greatest hits: resonant echoes and forgotten curiosities from another internet caretaker of this past year
every who down in whoville was sick of the rules—all the masks, sanitisers and closures of schools: how the Grinch stalled whovid
connoisseur: the importance of sustaining good taste to nourish good workdj earworm: five decades of pop music
the great conjunction: a keen-eyed photographer captures the International Space Station moving between Saturn and Jupiter (previously)
you’ll have to speak up—i’m wearing a towel: decoding the catalogue of Simpsons’ gags and one-liners that might have sailed over some viewers
crimes of the art: casing the most stolen painting ensemble, the Ghent Altarpiece (see previously), through history
2020: the musical: Miss Cellania’s annual assortment of lists recapping the year
catagories: ๐, ๐, ๐จ, ๐ถ, ๐ท, ๐ญ, 1970, networking and blogging, The Simpsons
Wednesday, 9 December 2020
show dna
Informed earlier by our faithful chronicler and now reprised for the cinematic adaptation of Larry McMurtry’s 1975 novel of the same name going into general release in US cinemas on this day in 1983, James L. Brooks directorial debut film (also writer and producer) has a throughline to the Simpsons. As a thank you gift for securing her and her production team an Academy Award (Terms of Endearment starring Shirley MacClaine, Danny DeVito, Debra Winger, Jeff Daniels, John Lithgow and Jack Nicholson did quite well at the Oscars) assistant Polly Platt had procured for her collaborator an original panel of the comic Life in Hell—a bleak strip about a depressed, neurotic rabbit called Bongo, specifically one from 1982 entitled “The Los Angeles Way of Death”—as imagined and illustrated by Matt Groening. A year later, with a new television project, a variety show with a series of sketches, Brooks reached out to Groening about developing a series of animated interstitial bumpers between segments. Fearing loss of creative control over his original characters, Groening created a wholly new cast based on his own family, giving the world the Simpsons as a regular part of The Tracey Ullmann Show.
Wednesday, 28 October 2020
couch gag
catagories: ๐ฌ, ๐, The Simpsons
Wednesday, 15 July 2020
aloha สปoe
catagories: ⚖️, ๐บ๐ธ, The Simpsons
Sunday, 26 April 2020
dynasty

catagories: ๐จ๐ณ, ๐บ๐ธ, ๐, foreign policy, The Simpsons
Sunday, 5 April 2020
sunday night line-up
On this evening in 1987, the fledgling Fox television network, we learn courtesy once again from Doctor Caligari’s Cabinet—our faithful chronicler, debuted its first two prime time offerings in Married… with Children followed by the sketch, variety programme The Tracey Ullman Show.
The later slotted with musical numbers conceived and choreographed by Paula Abdul, memorable comedic scenes and regular animated interstitials, the Simpsons premiered on episode three on 19 April, voiced by members of the troupe. The former show, airing for over a decade and exported to markets globally, launched the acting career Christina Applegate and Matt LeBlanc, ultimately developing the series Friends from one of the show’s spin-offs.
catagories: ๐บ๐ธ, ๐บ, 1987, The Simpsons
Monday, 16 March 2020
pyhรค urho
Overlooking the possibly fictional but actually assigned patron Bishop Henrik (martyred and fรชted on 19 January with a well-articulated legendarium of his own), a department store clerk of Finnish-extraction in the confusingly named town of Virginia, Minnesota lamenting that his homeland did not have a figure like Saint Patrick to celebrate their heritage and as a source of shared cultural cohesion and as an excuse to extend the general revelry (this year especially, please drink responsibly by staying at home or forever forfeit the right to be around other people hereafter) invented Saint Urho (hero) in 1956. Only known to diaspora (with the exception of the folklore and ethnography department at the University of Turku), Urho is variously credited with driving out the frogs (see also) or grasshoppers (with the command Heinรคsirkka, heinรคsirkka, mene tรครคltรค hiiteen! – Grasshopper, grasshopper, go back to Hell!—thus saving the grape harvest but inspiring acts that seem suspiciously like Springfield’s Whacking Day, incidentally on 10 May) and one is to regale themselves in royal purple and enjoy wine and/or purple beer so as to not mix one’s beverages.
catagories: ๐จ๐ฆ, ๐ซ๐ฎ, ๐ฎ๐ช, ๐บ๐ธ, ๐ป, holidays and observances, The Simpsons