Tuesday 20 October 2020

vitalienbrรผder

Executed by means of a beheading that as capitial punishment goes was extraordinarily dramatic on this day in 1401 (*1360), Klaus Stรถrtebeker (see previously for more of the lore) was the leader of a band of privateers—the Victual Brothers—engaged to supply Stockholm with provisions during a siege with Denmark.

Once their services were no longer needed after peace was achieved, they continued their piracy, adopting the new name for their group “Likedeelers”—the equal-sharers, maintaining a stronghold in East Frisia. Threatened with disruption to trade, a fleet of ships from Hanseatic Hamburg finally took on Stรถrtebeker, double-crossed by a disgruntled mate who sabotaged his escape vessel, and brought the fugitive back to city to stand trial. Despite offers to exchange a gold band long enough to encircle Hamburg for the freedom of him and his crew, Stรถrtebeker and seventy-three of his companions were sentenced to death for their crimes. The Lord Mayor did agree to acquises to one last request: that Stรถrtebeker be beheaded first and that all men he could pass after decapitation would be spared. Stรถrtebeker’s body rose (minus the head) and managed to walk past eleven crewmates before being tripped up. The Lord Mayor, however, did not honour those wishes.

7x7

whose side is justice department hunk trant finglepoz on, anyway: a treasury of Hallmark Channel movies counting down to the American election  

moving pictures: TIME magazine showcases one hundred of the most influential photographs  

malochio: an appreciation of the iconic, inspired CBS eye-logo  

giant steps: exploring the overlapping sensory experience of synaesthesia (previously) to the musical stylings of John Coltrane  

nazcat lines: archaeologists uncover a feline geoglyph in the Peruvian desert  

stranger danger: Patch the Pony transformed into a Halloween soundtrack 

fiscal cliffication: continued delays and deferment on financial aid will make it harder for the US economy to recover

Sunday 18 October 2020

the pharmacological merits of apotropaic magic

Just as drills for a zombie apocalypse is a useful heuristic for disaster-preparedness in general, so too are models of the inevitable vampiric saturation of run-away predation verses a more managed approach a tool for understanding contagion and immunity. Deferring to science, Dracula will always best our superstitions and folk-interventions.

this is what happens when streams are crossed

We previously enjoyed the musical mashups The Grey Album and the Beastles (full compilations at the link below) and so appreciated making the acquaintance with the broader repertoire of cross-over classics with Kraftwerk and here with Ray Parker Jr’s Ghostbusters vs Intergalactic (see also).

Thursday 15 October 2020

catch me when you can mishter lusk

Post-marked on this date in 1888 along with a parcel reportedly containing a preserved human kidney and addressed to chairman of the Whitechapel Vigilance Committee (return address “From Hell”), the letter ostensibly from the individual responsible for a series of gruesome mutilations that terrorised London identified only as Jack the Ripper is one of the few pieces of correspondence surrounding the unsolved killings that are considered authentic—with the same reservations that it might be an attention-seeking hoax like the thousands of communications received by newspapers and the police.

Though seemingly of the same provenance and style as two previous missives, the “Dear Boss” letter—which established the by-line—and the Saucy Jack postcard which a journalist later recanted, having confessed to a colleague as having made them up to solidify the narrative and place it all under one heading, directed towards The Star of London and Central News Agency, this penultimate letter was never fully repudiated and subject to on going study and public fascination. The writer notes, “I send you half the Kidne I took from one women prasarved it for you tother piece I fried and ate it was very nice.  I may send you the bloody knife that took it out if you only wate a while longer.”

Thursday 8 October 2020

7x7

blood pudding: British public reject Magnus Pike’s (see previously) modest proposal as taboo  

urban jungle: artist employs banana fibre cocoons for the Milan of our over-heated future  

a fungus among us: Public Domain Review explores fungi, folklore and fairyland

object lesson: a 1937 experiment with remote learning to contain a polio outbreak 

those speedy clouds: Alvin and the Chipmunks cover Phil Glass’ Koyaanisqatsi—see previously  

maybe i’m immune: James Corden performs a soulful parody of the Paul McCartney ballad 

 the cask of amontillado: Spanish navy upholding tradition of ageing wine at sea, transporting a buttload of sherry around the world

Monday 31 August 2020

roll for perception

Though we are a bit deflated to realise that holiday creep is one of the few things immune to COVID-19, we were delighted nonetheless to not only be reminded, via Super Punch, of the 1983-1985 run of the CBS animated series Dungeons & Dragons and pleased also to learn that there’s a Dungeon Master Halloween costume, which is appropriate for the home office and chairing, officiating remote role-playing adventures.
I can remember very much looking forward to this cartoon—almost to the exclusion of all others—on Saturday morning, identifying mainly with Presto the Magician, though in retrospect to find that he was a diligent but ineffectual try-hard, sort of like Schmendrick, was a bit of a blow, and only might be lured onto a roller coaster ride with the prospect that I might be transported to another realm. Bobby the Barbarian and his pet unicorn were dumb.  Victim of the moral panic that gripped the US at the time over the game and the dark arts (plus that Tom Hanks movie—Rona Jaffe’s Mazes & Monsters), only three seasons were produced with the concluding episodes scripted but animated.

Thursday 31 October 2019

dy’ halan gwav

Celebrated in Cornwall and Bretagne as the eve and first day of winter, Allantide (for the Arlan, the sainted bishop of Quimper) is a feast of remembrance and to give comfort to the souls of the departed yet in that transitional state between this world and the hereafter. Local traditions vary greatly but it was customary to exchange big, polished apples that were achieving peak ripeness at the time, carve turnip jack-o’-lanterns and play divination games—some of which have been advanced to mark the change not in the season but rather the calendar year.

happy halloween!

Thanks as always for stopping by. Spooky tidings and ghoulish good fortunes to you and yours!

Monday 28 October 2019

jimi-jam

Our thanks again to Nag on the Lake for turning our attention towards party tradition that’s entering its fifth iteration, the mundane Halloween ball (Jimi Halloween, ๅœฐๅ‘ณใƒใƒญใ‚ฆใ‚ฃใƒณ)—organised and attended by adults wanting to celebrate the occasion (see also) but were not yet ready for the commitment to flamboyant and elaborate costumes. Instead, party-goers would dress for everyday situations and potentially awkward interactions, the outfits begging the question what-are-you-supposed-to-be and soliciting a satisfying answer of acknowledgment and understanding. If I were a judge at the event, I’d certainly award top honours to Man Face-Swapping with his Starbucks Cup. I did a thing. Many more relatable characters at the link up top.

Wednesday 23 October 2019

7x7

trick-or-treat: communities in race to best each other with increasing draconian ordinances regulating Halloween

huzzah: the utopian ideals behind Renaissance Fairs

dog whistle/bull horn: critiquing Facebook for the low quality propaganda platform it is, via Marginal Revolution

starchitecture: pairing Zodiac houses with their representative designers

your trial period has expired: how free storage drove every thing out if the archives and mandated everything be always available, via Duck Soup

world unique promotional product identity & emotion: the strange world of Vater Abraham, author of the Smurfs’ theme song among a few others

noir: Bruce McCorkindale’s Art House Muppets for Inktober

Tuesday 30 April 2019

walpurisnacht

Our faithful chronicler reminds that on this night, the date shared with many other momentous occasions including the annexation of Hawaii (1900), the fall of Saigon (1975) and the coming out of the tv character of actor and comedian Ellen DeGeneres (1997), Beltane Eve is observed (previously here and here) in the northern hemisphere, coopted locally as the syncretion of the day before the feast day of Saint Walpurga, an abbess and Anglo-Saxon missionary from Devonshire to the Frankish Empire.
Converts were encouraged to pray to her for intercession and protection from witchcraft—though Walpurga’s patronage was restricted to hydrophobia, odd given the witch connection, and sailors in distress. Though there’s a lot of regional variation in the way the holiday is kept across northern Europe, common customs include bonfires—a ceremonial burning and/or celebration of the diabolical and a sort of sealing off the portal, marking the last opportunity that the supernatural can cross over from the nether world, until Halloween.

Wednesday 31 October 2018

happy halloween!

As always, thanks for visiting and spooky tidings to you and yours!

Saturday 27 October 2018

fancy dress party

In case you are in need of a bit more inspiration to come up with a Halloween custom as the holiday creeps closer and close, why not consult your friendly neighbourhood AI.

Outdoing last year’s training session, Janelle Shane taught her neural network (previously) on a dataset of over seven thousand outfit ideas and had her efforts profiled in the New York Times, with illustrations of the learning process, trial and error illustrated by Jessia Ma—even the ones that seemed to defy sense and representation.
Check them all out at the links above and perhaps find a character that speaks to you for trick-or-treating or your office party—and yes, there’s even a whole sub-set of ill-advised sexy costumes.

What are your favourites?

Friday 26 October 2018

bobby (boris) pickett and the crypt-kickers

We enjoyed this appreciation of the quintessential Halloween anthem, the 1962 novelty song “Monster Mash,” from Tedium—delving into the piece’s musical inspirations and long legacy of homages.
Aspiring actor and musician Pickett was performing a cover of the Diamonds’ “Little Darin’” one evening but substituted the middle monologue with a horror movie exposition of a bridge (in the voice of Boris Karloff)  and the audience cheered, and drawing from the earlier novelty hit, The Hollywood Argyles’ “Alley Oop,” and the dance sensation the Mashed Potato, captured by Dee Dee Sharp’s “Mashed Potato Time” and “Gimme Gravy,” Pickett went on to collaborate and compose the graveyard smash. Among the original Crypt-Kickers was pianist Leon Russell. Listen to the song, covers and everything adjacent at the link above.

Wednesday 17 October 2018

decorative gourd season

Building off an earlier exercise in training a neural network to conjure up extremely plausible sounding names for craft beer and small batch breweries, Janelle Shane (previously here and here) brilliantly tweaked the naming conventions slightly to infuse the results with pumpkin spice and other seasonal trappings. Here are some of our favourites but they whole beer menu is definitely worth sampling:


Bog Porter
Winter Winter This Dead Ale
Warmer Hollow
Ale Gore
Spice Prophecy
Pumpkin Disaster
Faceless Ole Ale
Winter Zuul

Check out AI Weirdness (aka Lewis and Quark) at the link above for more and to study the methodology and learn how to develop an artificial intelligence of your own.

Monday 15 October 2018

6x6

mystery machine: a 1999 Scooby-Doo parody of “The Blair Witch Project” from Cartoon Network

the history league: jerseys for fantasy sports teams centred on momentous events, via Shadow Manor’s Art of Darkness

popular science: though presently mostly relegated to children’s literature, pop-up books were once the stuff of serious textbooks

feng shui: the opening of Kyoto’s first dispersed hotel promises visitors an authentic, immersive experience in the old capital

public service announcement: contemporary artists offers updates on the iconic vintage series from the Works Progress Administration, a New Deal organisation

siren song: the micronation of Uลพpis, an enclave in the Lithuanian capital of Vilnius

Saturday 28 October 2017

sexy sexy dombie sexy cat

For those still undecided on a Halloween costume, one can always repair to a neural network, we discover via Fancy Notions, for last-minute consultation.
Naturally robots were not prepared for this highly idiosyncratic task but soon became more authoritarian. Ranging from Sexy DVORAK keyboard to suggesting in later iterations that one aspire to be a Starfleet Shark or Mario Lander or the Statue of Pizza or the Twin Spider Mermaid the sub-routine seems to be learning. Check out more recommendations at the links above and see if you find your inspiration.

Tuesday 24 October 2017

trick or treat

For those out there still harboring doubts that Dear Dotard’s regime was about anything other than personal enrichment and propelling a self-styled billionaire from his true status as a heavily leveraged economically and moral bankrupt individual, we present a festive Halloween baseball cap on offer as official presidential memorabilia whose hue compliments that monster’s hair and complexion. It’s becoming a serious challenge to imagine anything more terrifying than the banality of merchandising that betrays a blissful ignorance of the missives and message that it is sending.

Sunday 8 October 2017

aka manto or things that go dump in the night

As part of its annual celebration of the spooky and ghoulish leading up to Halloween, Atlas Obscura gives us a brief but intimate—to let one’s imagination get the better of oneself—primer on the Japanese yลkai (previously here, here and here) that tend to haunt private bathrooms and public, communal facilities.
The bathroom horror trope, predictably, since one is by all rights alone (or within maybe uncomfortable earshot) can be terrifying and could easily become more than one cares to indulge (even the idea of looking in a mirror can be hijacked into a horrific prospect with the right milieu) so consider oneself forwarded, but most seem to be just mischievous, muttering just out of range, making untoward noises or swiping toilet paper and other pranks, if not pitiable spectres and there’s a very specific ritual to summon up, sort of like scrying Bloody Mary (or if you’d rather, Moaning Myrtle from Harry Potter), these tortured ghosts that inhabit certain stalls (the third one or the last one) and people are supposedly due for an encounter with these ghosts within a month after learning of their sad fates. Others still seem more sent to clean-shame those who might not keep theirs in the most hygienic of conditions, with a nasty little water sprite that’s said to lick the mildew off of one’s sink and bathtub. Visit, if you dare, the links above to learn more.