Having always assumed that such specimens were just giant dandelions (see previously with another pre-seed example), I was pleased to learn was a related but distinct species that grows across Europe and North America and goes by the common names meadow Salsify, showy Goat’s-Beard (Wiesen Bocksbart auf Deutsche) or Jack-Go-To-Bed-At-Noon (as the yellow flower—see above—only opens in the morning sunshine. The blowball is much larger than that of the dandelion and the leaves are more grass-like rather than serrated.
Wednesday 15 June 2022
Saturday 11 June 2022
e.t. phone home
Premiering in US theatres on this day in 1982—following its debut at the Cannes Film Festival in May—the Steven Spielberg and Melissa Mathison collaboration featuring the acting talents of Henry Thomas, Peter Coyote, Dee Wallace and Drew Barrymore is a retelling of Peter Pan framed by the director and producer’s own suburban childhood and experiences of his parents’ divorce. An extra terrestrial botanist accidentally left behind on Earth befriends a human boy and his siblings and tries to find a way to reconnect with his scouting mission whilst thwarting attempts of government scientists trying to capture and study him. The iconic, arresting scene of E.T. and Elliot’s flight to the forest is an homage to the magical realism of the 1951 Miacolo a Milano by Vittorio De Sica of a poverty-stricken community in post-war Milan who are cheated out of a potential windfall, reprimanded by angels for harnessing supernatural powers but nonetheless are free and eventually escape on broomsticks.
Friday 10 June 2022
9x9
web revival: rediscovering the serendipity of hyperlink daisy chains—via Joe Jenett
free-range children: relocating from London, Ontario to Amsterdam
sure-footed: a goat-like heavy-lifting robot called BEX under development—via Super Punch
lavender fields of surrey: a seasonal stroll through an aromatic patch of land
mono men: the Punk, Grunge aesthetic of Art Chantry
hyakutsuki-in: a beautiful locker-style cemetery in Toyko
hounds of love: a 1992 interview with Kate Bush (previously), breaking down her 1985 album track by track
sell your cleverness and buy bewilderment: an enigmatic sign spotted on a nike trail
jacob hive maker: first streaming film Wax; Or the Discovery of Television Among the Bees (1991)
Thursday 2 June 2022
7x7
phillumeny: venerable Japanese matchbox manufacturer shuttering after almost a century
fpoty: Pink Lady’s finalist gallery of superlative food photographs in its annual competition—via Everlasting Blรถrt
posidonia australis: researchers determine that a giant patch of ribbon weed in Shark Bay Australia a
singular, ancient and expansive plantshadow gradient: expanding hole optical illusion is a touch trypophobic—via Boing Boing
metamorphosis: late fifteenth century ecologist and artist Maria Sibylla Merian who was among the first naturalist to closely observe insects and understand their life cycles
casein chipping: more on cheese heists and ways to stop them
philately: a travelogue of postage stamps of imaginary places—see also
Saturday 28 May 2022
8x8
scotch tapes: commercials, idents and continuity from British television from 1984 salavaged from VHS casettes
boldly go!: a medley of songs from and about the Star Trek franchise—see also
apiculture: a survey of bee hives throughout the ages
latex: Goodyear and the US Department of Defence are partnering to manufacture tyres from dandelions—see previouslykleksographien: revisiting the blotograms (previously) of Justinus Kerner plus other inspired symmetries
red wine and ginger ale: Vulture correspondent Rebecca Alter samples all the food combinations referenced in Harry’s House
diagrammatic map: another look at how Massimo Vignelli presented mass transit to the masses—see previously here and here—via Things magazine
the fantastic journey: an obscure 1977 time-travel series starring Joan Collins and John Saxon
Monday 16 May 2022
6x6
dandelion wine: slow drinks made with our favourite noxious weed—see also
give that wolf a banana and before that wolf eats my grandma: Norway’s Eurovision entry—via Nag on the Lake’s Sunday Links
stablecoin: the collapse of NFT and crypto markets
for every bear that ever there was: 1984 reportage of Keanu Reeves covering a teddy bear convention for the CBC—via Everlasting Blรถrt
homeostatic awakening: new developments in the Fermi paradox—see previously here and here
quattro bianchi: Italy’s answer to the Long Island Iced Tea packs a wallop
Sunday 15 May 2022
apicius
We quite enjoyed revisiting the topic of a mysterious, most-favoured herb of Antiquity called silphium (previously)—considered a gift from Apollo and used as condiment, perfume, aphrodisiac, and seasoning and with medicinal uses ranging from anti-haemorrhoidal to contraceptive, imported into the Greek and Roman world from a narrow, microclimate in Syria that was resistant to transplantation. Over-harvesting and over-grazing coupled with climate change curried its abrupt disappearance from cupboards and medicine cabinets two millennia hence and serves as a warning best heeded about our own culinary staples and how familiar and enriching flavours and seasoning might meet the same fate. Much more at the links above.
Wednesday 6 April 2022
fungi seeks same
Being long-time enthusiasts about plant and mushroom networking and communication, we quite enjoyed learning of this very preliminary, new research that goes further, responsibly suggesting analogues between the chemical and electrical signals that funguses employ to coordinate among colonies or distant parts of themselves—previously also compared to neurons—and human language. Analysis and attempts at decoding these shared messages reveal that missives are dispatched in packets with a vocabulary of possibly up to fifty words that vary across different varieties of mushrooms with split gills being the most chatty and nuanced among the species sampled.
Monday 4 April 2022
breadbasket
Via Miss Cellania, we quite enjoyed this appreciation of the Ukrainian roots of wheat world-wide—see also—and how grain-cultivation and baking traditions owe a heavy debt to the Crimean peninsula and successive exoduses and displacement—and what those fleeing carried with them. National banner modelled on the blue sky over the waves of grain, times like these reveal the depth of our connections and dependence.
Thursday 31 March 2022
dรญa de cรฉsar chรกvez
Commemorated as a holiday in several food producing regions of the United States, the life and legacy of the civil rights reformer and labour activist of Cรฉsar Chรกvez, born this day in 1927 (†1993), whom along wit fellow farm worker Dolores Huerta unionised and rallied for better conditions for all.
Sunday 13 March 2022
sant’ansovino
Fรชted on this day, the sainted bishop of Camerino-San Severino Marche in the Apennines refused the high office until could secure personal guarantees from Holy Roman Emperor, Louis II—for who Ansovinus was former confessor—that his congregation would be exempt from military conscription, one of the chief jobs of bishops during that time was as recruiter for the imperial army. Reportedly having the gift of inexhaustibly multiplying stores of wheat in the regional granary in Castel Raimondo and for producing a copious amount of crops from his own meagre plot of land, never refusing to share, this ninth century figure is named the patron of agriculture and the protector of small farmers.
catagories: ๐ฎ๐น, ✝️, ๐ฑ, ๐, Middle Ages
Thursday 10 March 2022
7x7
stacy’s dad has got me down bad: a Fountains of Wayne cover from a different perspective
imperial trans-antarctic expedition: the shipwreck of Ernest Shackleton’s 1914 exploratory mission discovered
beachcomber: eighteenth-century seaweed pressings speak to fecklessness and romanceithaca: an new AI model is helping scholars decipher and date ancient inscriptions
x-wing: Star Wars space craft size comparison
snowmen: David Lynch’s haunting images—evocative of Eraserhead from Boise, Idaho in the early ‘90s
there’s a doll, inside of doll, inside a doll, inside a dolly: Robbie Williams’ 2016 Party Like a Russian was inspired by an encounter with the inner-circle of oligarchs when asked to perform at a New Year’s Eve party
Sunday 30 January 2022
root directory
A happily reactivated Present /&/ Correct shop blog (do check out their sundries) brings us this interesting series of studies curated by Wageningen University of hand renderings of root systems (see also here and here) of trees and plants whose subterranean presences and connections can be far more substantial and wide-reaching than we surface-dealers can fathom.
catagories: ๐ณ๐ฑ, ๐ฑ, ๐ณ, ๐, libraries and museums
Friday 21 January 2022
barn
From Neil Young and the ensemble Crazy Horse, with whom the artist has been collaborating for over a half a century, with videography by Young’s wife Daryl Hanna, we are quite enjoying this new album—his forty-first and seventh together with Billy Talbot and Ralph Molina of Crazy Horse since 1968—released last month.
Thursday 20 January 2022
brearley architects + urbanists
Elevated above the marshes of the Yuandang estuary of Shanghai, a Chinese-Australian design group called BAU has created a graceful, sliver of a bridge to connect two areas of wetlands. With a pavilion and observation platform in the middle of the span, the structure integrates infrastructure with ecology and aesthetics. Much more from Dezeen at the link above.
catagories: ๐จ๐ณ, ๐, ๐ฑ, architecture
Wednesday 19 January 2022
7x7
tomm¥ €a$h: rapper presents a sofa in the shape of bread
banana republic: an exhibit that takes a critical look at the fruit trade—see alsofield manual: the predecessor agency to the US CIA issued a guide to simple sabotage which speaks to America’s present state
bio-rovers: Marimo moss balls (previously) could become ambulatory—see also here and here
spinthatiscope: an actual 1940s toy harnessing radioactive decay fragments of life: a suite of animated emoji from Andreas Samuelsson
middle c: a space-saving piano designed to fit in a corner—see also
Sunday 19 December 2021
8x8
schwibbogen: a look at Germany’s Erzgebirge’s Christmas decorative arts traditions—see also
lakshmi-narayan: a looted sculpture returned to Nepal becomes a god again
wind in your sails: a giant kite will pull a ship across the ocean in a demonstration project to cut emissions
all songs considered: NPR’s Bob Boilen’s recommended listening from the past year
farmscrapers: advances in hydroponics and robot-assisted harvesting are making vehicle crop-growing a reality
wysiwyg: Anna Mills on her typography and creative outlook
carry on regardless: the comic language pf Professor Stanley Unwin
god rest you merry, gentlemen: the comma in this carol makes us wonder about punctuation
Wednesday 15 December 2021
7x7
the hallmark channel: a treasury of classic festive films from Eastern Europe
savage garden: the ruins of Rome’s Colosseum was once a wild green oasis full of exotic plants—via Messy Nessy Chic
touching the sun: the Parker Solar Probe enters and safely exits the corona
barcode architects: a new triangular high-rise for Rotterdam’s maritime district
smart tweed: artificial intelligence predicts the next holiday, must-have gifts
็ฌ็ต: Japanese in-situ heating solutions called kotatsu (see previously) have been around for a long time
what day is it boy: the labour shortage hits Scrooge & Marley
Tuesday 14 December 2021
dyer’s polypore
Having seen the process of extracting dyes from our fungal friends before, via Things Magazine, we not only quite enjoyed perusing through this swath collection of colours derived from mushrooms in its own right but also appreciated the site as an important point of departure for cultivating a deeper appreciation for the mycorrhizal network that connects us all.
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