aăâ (13. 863)

Originally started as a Spiritualist club (with the above cipher, the first three letters of the alphabet) by a group of clerks working for the colonial government to hold ouija sessions and practise mediumship, within a year, whilst conducting a séance, members received a revelatory message heralding a future universal religion, leading to the formal founding of Caodaism (Đại Đạo Tam Kỳ Phổ Độ, The Great Faith for the Third Universal Religion) on this day in 1926—a syncretic movement that incorporates the ethical precepts of Confucianism, the belief of karma and transmigration of Buddhism, Taoist duality and the centralised hierarchy of Catholicism. The first disciple, named first pope Ngô Văn Chiêu for the Holy See in Tây Ninh, declined the role as spiritual leader, never intending for his interest and study in the occult to become a mass movement—retiring to the countryside for a life of seclusion and the first pontiff accepting the job only agreeing to do so provided he be referred to as the Acting Pope for the duration of his reign. The three saints and prophets of Đức Cao Đài are counted as Sun Yat-sen, physician and revolutionary who founded the Kuomintang and lead to the overthrow of the Qing dynasty, Nguyễn Bỉnh Khiêm, sixteenth century poet and government administrator, later revered as the oracle of the splinter faction known as the School of Teaching Goodness and author Victor Hugo, whose turn to spiritism and deism after retiring from writing and self-imposed exile on the Channel Islands informed much of doctrines of Caodaism. Banned during the French-Indochina war and during Communism as subversive to the state, the church was finally allowed to reconstitute itself in 1997 in Vietnam, practised by the diaspora and numbering around six-million adherents.

 

synchronoptica

one year ago: the dilemma of the video age (with synchronoptica) plus an iconic photo booth

 

two years ago: Suddenly plus more boating adventures 

 

three years ago: more hikes through the vineyards plus Hamas attacks Israel 

 

four years ago:  absinthe banned in Switzerland, the Feast of Sergius and Bacchus plus assorted links to revisit

five years ago: a cool ghoul and your ghost host, the Cyrus Charter, a bird wife plus a catalogue of invasive toys

 

six years ago: most senior US government officials in quarantine,  a typing tutor, a birdhouse apartment plus more historic maps

 

seven years ago: a minimum wage machine

 

eight years ago: more links to check out, East Germany’s Tag der Republik, a visit to an automotive and aviation museum plus himpathy and related neologisms

 

tea and gargoyles (13. 856)

As we get firmly ensconced in the Spooky Season, we are directed, courtesy of {feuilleton} to the the first modern ghost story anthology, as selected and compiled by Lady Cynthia Asquith—which marks its centenary in print this month (the cover from the 1970 edition pictured but all the original tales can be read here). As editor, Asquith’s discernment is to be lauded for expanding the genre to include the uncanny and nebulously menacing, recruiting notable contemporaries, like D H Lawrence, Algernon Blackwood, Hugh Walpole and Enid Bagnold, with some magical realism, psychological distress, preternatural abilities accepted as fact that anticipate later collections, like those featured in The Twilight Zone, without straying into the realm of unbidden horror or rustic superstition. Oliver Onions’ two vignettes, the author dismissing them as trifles, explores the notion that broadcast signals (the wireless a fairly new innovation at the time) are somehow interfering with spectral repose and invite hauntings, and Asquith’s own contribution under the pseudonym C L Ray deals in cursed antiques and unfinished business. A respected author in her own right, Asquith was also a diarist and a Royal-Watcher with a regular column on the Family and was personal secretary to J M Barrie, who left her his entire literary estate, except Peter Pan.  

synchronoptica

one year ago: Trump dollar coins (with synchronoptica) 

two years ago: anchor Dan Rather assaulted, an ongoing treasure hunt plus another scavenger hunt  

three years ago: a return visit to Markbreit 

four years ago: The Tornados’ Telstar plus assorted links to revisit

five years ago: The Final Programme (1973)

six years ago: the Feast of Francis of Assisi, cross-section infographics plus Sir David Attenborough as insects

seven years ago: a pastel makeover for London’s subway carriages,  cinnamon-roll day plus award-winning laundromats of Japan

eight years ago: a sketch a day for October, the International Geophysical Year plus Bavaria’s plans for a Space Force of its own

 

haute cuisine (13. 848)

If we are to believe gourmand and historian Jean-Paul Aron’s account, French food culture owes a debt to the Revolution and the guillotine that foisted the gastronomic practises of the aristocracy to the the Third Estate and the petite bourgeoisie that filled the void left by the dispatched nobility. Portraying an interesting if not unappetising picture of the evolution of the French table and restaurateurs over the course of the nineteenth century with all of its left-overs recycling schemes that trickled down through the classes and feats of conspicuous, competitive gluttony.  A translation of Le mangeur du XIXᵉ siecle, the whole volume can be checked-out here.

synchronoptica

one year ago:  a visit to Éguisheim (with synchronoptica)

two years ago: The Taking of Pelham 123 plus a giant hybrid sheep 

three years ago: the dissolution of the Papal States (1870) 

four years ago: assorted links to revisit, more on snail compasses plus Gulf War II (2001)

five years ago: Peanuts remixed, more on US exceptionalism plus a classic from Musical Youth

six years ago: Colonialism and Abstract Art (1936), more musical mashup annuals from Hood Internet,  Trump contracts the COVID-19 virus plus the caretaker presidency of Edith Wilson

seven years ago: more links worth revisiting 

eight years ago: the fight to save a remnant of ancient forest in Germany plus thumbnails of terrain

 

9x9 (13. 836)

cyberselfish: Paulina Borsook’s 2000 book about the libertarian, uncharitable culture of high tech is back in print after a reevaluation of its foresight 

the full english: breaches of British etiquette no one will ever call you out for transgressing—via Nag on the Lake  

el niño: the coming weather pattern, climatologist predict, will be the most powerful in recorded history  

familect: jargon and running-jokes only understood within one’s extended household—what are some of your examples? 

i want an explanation—why is there a child on the bridge: the series finale of the 80s sitcom Webster had a cross-over with Star Trek: TNG—see also   

artist’s bigature: Grace Baldwin’s larger-than-life junk drawer  

deliquesce: of a solid structure or lattice, to melt or dissolve by absorbing moisture from the atmosphere—like exposed salts or wilting mushrooms  

nor’easter: powerful, unseasonably early storm slams eastern seaboard  

symphonie magnétophonique: a profile of Else Marie Pade, the first Danish composer of electronic and concrete music

the great canon of yongle (13. 835)

Commissioned by the Yongle Emperor, the third ruler of the Ming Dynasty circa 1403, the ambitious scope and size made it the largest general encyclopaedia in the world (technical a leishu—類書, literally a category book, a genre of East Asian reference materials different from the modern concept and more akin to anthologies though containing the same comprehensive, encyclopaedic knowledge) despite there only four hundred extant volumes, a small percentage of the original eleven thousand, until surpassed by Wikipedia in 2007. Over one hundred elite scholars versed in all subjects, poetry, literature, philosophy, arts and the natural sciences were recruited for the project, mostly written by manuscript though printing technology already existed at the time of its publication in 1408, the emperor so pleased with the finished product, he wrote the lengthy preface, highlighting the importance of learning and preservation, himself. Most the rolls were lost during the Opium Wars and Boxer Rebellion, and whilst the most complete editions (representing only four percent of the whole) are kept at the national libraries of Beijing and Taipei, with a few rolls held by the British Library, the Bodleian, and the US library of congress, it was this story of a textile tycoon and antiquarian’s quest to reunite two rediscovered volumes at a dear price from a rare books auction in Paris that provided us with a gateway to explore the cultural compendium. More from Sixth Tone at the link up top.

synchronoptica

one year ago: a return to the Alsace (with synchronoptica)

two years ago: hotel darkrooms for hobbyist photographers, a very short papacy plus Dawn: A Portrait of a Teenage Runaway (1976)  

three years ago: assorted links worth the revisit 

four year ago: for the Queen to use, the Discovery of the True Cross, Marimekko Oyj plus assorted links to revisit

five years ago: France’s TGV goes into service (1981) plus a change in UK license plates post Brexit

six years ago: Art Povera, pet diplomacy plus Trump’s latest nominee to the US Supreme Court

seven years ago: the flag of China plus US-Germany relations

eight years ago: more links to enjoy plus the economics principle of chartalism

 

10x10 (13. 829)

danse macabre: a detailed and comprehensive exploration of the allegorical art genre—see previously—via Web Curios 

taos hum: the transcendental art of Emil Bisstram was a lure to attract nuclear scientists to Los Alamos—see also 

háskólabíó: Iceland mourns the loss of another beloved glacier—see ptreviously  

glimpse 17775: JWST studies mysterious red dots seeding the early Cosmos, suggesting that they were “black hole stars” 

singularity syllabus: a helpful round-up of recent developments on the AI front 

💂‍♀️: an in depth explainer regarding the controversy over the UK royal guards’ bear-skin hats and their ursine origins  

summa lacticinorum: an 1477 treatise on cheese and dairy—via Strange Company  

they’re all good boys: the canine portraiture of Paolo Veronese that ultimately put him on the wrong side of the Inquisition 

infrasound: the source of the ultra-low frequency global hum that has baffled scientists may be the crashing of waves—see also  

νεῶν κατάλογος: an interactive site of the Achaean fleet epically described in Homer’s Iliad—via Kottke—see also

fleuron (13. 804)

Named for the ornamental hedera symbol or printers’ flower, this growing gallery of historical, pictorial letterpress work, ranging from the fifteenth to the mid-twentieth century, curated by category, the Garden of Flowers from Heikki Lotvonen—via discover via fellow internet peripatetic Messy Nessy—is a fantastic homage to the typographic and ingenuity in the outlines, shading and hashing of the printed glyph as a precursor to ASCII art (Lotvonen’s own bachelor’s thesis was on the subject of the Amiga moveable type—see also),
like this eighteenth century demonstration of transfer printing for decorating ceramics, requiring an arduous and precise level of typesetting to prepare the printing plate first which according to the sources never quite turned out to everyone’s satisfaction, or this rather arresting view of the city of Valencia rendered in letterforms from the 1870s, painstakingly formatted by Castilian compositor Andrés Ferrer. There are thousands of examples of broadsheets, mastheads and spot illustrations to peruse that show the ingenuity and inventiveness of print-setting to use existing slugs in the workshop, letters rotated but still sticking to the script. Much more at the links above.

talk of the town (13. 801)

For over a decade, David O has been blogging the Manhattan weekly from the beginning in 1925 on a schedule that mirrors when each issue would have gone to print, placing the current posts in the mid-1930s, we learn courtesy of MetaFilter. Though founded as a more sophis-ticated humour magazine originally, distinguished from cornier publications, with reviews and reportage about local happenings, it established itself as a preëminent forum for fiction, essays and long-read journalism after World War II, and has been lauded as an effective conduit for introducing a sizeable readership to modern literature. We didn’t have a stack of back issues at home—National Geographic, yes—but I know I had a subscription at one point and am drawn to any article that revisits an old catalogue or periodicals (I think it was The Awl, also based in New York City that had a regular segment about flipping through magazines from the early 1990s), but this guided tour of editions receding from living memory is even better than sifting through the archives, with context and a bit of history and contemporary analogues, like highlighting the first instance of the Medusa trope for its cartoons followed up with other artists carrying on the tradition through the decades. Scrolling along with Eustace Tilley (see above) a far better use of one’s time with more potential for serendipity than one’s social feeds.

11x11 (13. 790)

hospoda: Czech tavern etiquette and drinking culture  

70up: following the death of Michael Apted, the cast of longest running documentary series is bowing out after the next and final instalment  

god’s own hand: the role of animacy in English genitive formation, X’s Y vs the Y of X  

area marker balls: those giant fishing bobs on power lines  

hexagonal close-packed: researchers form high pressure, high temperature ice, suspected to be present in the core of Uranus and Neptune 

dermatoglyphics: palm-reading and traditional medicine have always had a common intersection 

tacuini ægritudinum: the journey of a mysterious medical manuscript, supposedly from the legendary island of Hy-Brasil, from Baghdad to Ireland—via Strange Company  

short imaged monologues: Anthropic’s Claude responds to call to slow down AI research to prevent us from being wiped out by a paperclip maximiser—more here   

i pledge to the greatest president in the history of the united states that loves us so much he cant’t even breath: Trump urges crowd at the Republican Midterm convention to cheat like hell    

and although death is represented in the form of a human skeleton, yet this is only an emblem for death is not a being but a state: early modern flap books aimed at young readers with a special format for transformations   

between the sheets: a 1930s recipe for a cognac sour sees a resurgence in popularity

synchronoptica

one year ago: animated vignettes from Plantopia (with synchronoptica), assorted links worth revisiting plus a banger from Hozier

two years ago: more links to enjoy, nights on Earth, the Ig Nobel prize, prayers vs spells plus Cloud Appreciation Day 

three years ago: Putin and Kim meet 

four years ago: the Poet Laureate’s tribute to the Queen, the Beatles’ Apple Electronics venture plus even more links worth the revisit

five years ago: your daily demon: Marchosias, more links to enjoy, the first teenage all music and dance show plus the release of Super Mario Brothers (1985)

six years ago: dissecting the original COVID hotspot, more on radio alphabets, The Stand, the stately manor that inspired Wuthering Heights plus St Venerius

a tale of a tub (13. 788)

Taken by academics as an over the top invictum against academia itself and an attack on the Royal Society and Enlightenment science of Newton and an afford to decency—even more so than “A Modest Proposal”—Jonathan Swift’s 1726 visit of Lemuel Gulliver to the levitating island of Laputa and its earth-bound territories speak to our current embrace of artificial intelligence as a short-cut and a short-circuit of critical thinking in the classroom and beyond. Resonant across three-centuries, our traveller’s audience with the regent and court magisters find him on a flying landmass (like contemporary tech utopias like the abandoned project NEOM), though with a limited range of six league (thirty kilometres) due to the specific geological properties, rare Earth elements, needed to support them aloft. Philosophers were so preoccupied with speculative thought that they needed prodding by dedicated retainers to get them to listen to anyone or social engage in any form. Most scientific advances remained in the realm of the abstract and theoretical, failing to work in practise, like extracting sunlight from cucumbers, but one device does, despite enormous effort and inefficiencies does work, a very labour-intensive wooden contraption that allows even the most ignorant and ungifted persons to participate in poetry, politics, mathematics and theology without study—neither reading nor writing—the gears of word calculator rotated by forty men into position, forming words and sentence fragments to be assembled by scribes, predicting the underclass supporting the energy-guzzling, autocomplete nature of ChatGPT. Laputa is an expansion of Swift’s earliest prose parody of the title, the allegory generally understood to be an attack on internecine Christianity but chiefly a lament on what passed for scholarship, rote memorisation and for those who embraced this new learning without caution or criticism. It is fitting that after departing this innovation-hub, Gulliver travels to his final destination to the equine society of the Houyhnhnms and their human work-horses, mute and brute, weeks spent in the company of the masters, trying to learn their language and copy their gait in order to avoid remaining just another yahoo in their eyes.

10x10 (13. 777)

futura is a favourite and we’re always going to root for her, but then for legibility you can’t go wrong with frutiger: the very model of a modern day typographer—see previously  

if every girl had a diary: filmmaker Sadie Benning’s quiet confessions to her confident Pixel Vision camera delivers a powerful message from the shelter and safety of her bedroom  

leisurama: the prefabricated Mid-Century Modern vacation home of Montauk, Long Island  

learning to live with an elephant: a 1968 animated short from Terry Gilliam—see previously  

 

movie maps: worldwide cinematic address—comprehensive but missing our village’s cameo—via Nag on the Lake 

insecta odonata: dragonflies migrate over long-distances, comparable to Monarch butterflies 

 🛂: the world’s current one hundred ninety-nine passports mapped as a data-visualisation—via Quantum of Sollazzo  

last and first men: the 1930 science fiction work from Olaf Stapledon who examined humanity from a height of two billion years  

only major western capital without a monumental arch: groundbreaking to begin for the Arc d’Trump in two weeks—see previously

synchronoptica

one year ago: Stravinsky’s Serenade in A (with synchronoptica), protests in Nepal plus more revelations on the closeness of Trump and Epstein

two years ago: voting from space, split-screen campaigning plus British holiday camps 

three years ago: assorted links worth the revisit plus traditional Palestinian embroidery 

four years ago: a banger from The Stone Temple Pilots (1994) 

five years ago: statehood for the US capital district, the Battle of the Teutoburg Forest (9), a rewilded oasis in DC plus more links to enjoy

six years ago: the founding of Washington, DC (1791), the dispute over Hans Island, a celebrated lighthouse plus AI-generated super villans

illiterate boyfriend test (13. 775)

Keeping English orthography being what it is and the profusion of loan-words, established or trendy, and the sage prescription not to judge a person’s pronunciation as they may be saying it aloud for the first time—and elocution is not monolithic, as I am reminded often by H when he recalls how a server at a Chipotle’s in Washington DC had the gall to correct his ordering Shiraz (ʃɪˈɹɑːz from širâz, a city in Iran) with how it’s apparently said in American English (that waiter probably does not shop at Targét)we found this apparently popular quiz making the rounds on the internet, supposedly underscoring a reversal in the intellect gap between the genders (and it is coded very hetero-normative, like the earlier profusion of the “Alpine Divorce”—which is disappointingly somehow less sinister than such a term could be, an interesting cultural artefact and signifier. The vocabulary of the more widespread versions include: thyme, epitome, challah, gnocchi, fuchsia, colonel, queue, niche, pseudonym and hyperbole. Such shibboleths (maybe that word should have been part of the test) ought not to be highlighted as some sort of relationship red flag and strikes one as performative leverage for embarrassing patrons in restaurants and making the table feel uncomfortable and schooled, or for an excuse for a dating off-ramp.  Coming across this on UNESCO’s International Day of Literacy, the phenomenon also seems to capitalise on the worrying prognosis that people no longer read.

9x9 (13. 759)

it-narratives: the imagined inner lives of inanimate objects  

inwats: the history and use-case of the 1-800 number  

du big bang à mardi matin: Claude Cloutier’s overview of the evolution of life on Earth in his signature animation style reminiscent of aquatint printing  

shadowology: more art installations from Vincent Bal—see previously  

the decade you’ve been waiting for: Paste magazine’s contention top hundred songs of the 80s—via MetaFilter, see previously  

after the fire: Los Angeles residents moving entire homes to burnt out, vacant lots as a cheaper alternative to rebuilding 

it’s fantastic! it’s futuristic! it’s fatalistic! it’s science fiction: a 1973 BBC Omnibus documentary by Harley Cokeliss  

escape claudes: two chatbots placed in a recursive loop—see previously 

hack’s law: the hidden maths of rivers that calm the waters—via Kottke

synchronoptica

one year ago: a visit to Geraberg (with synchronoptica), woodblock printer Sekino Jun’ichirō plus the branding of the US Civil Defence Corps

two years ago: a pivotal moment in the Star Trek timeline, aspiring travel-writers, assorted links worth revisiting, a trip to Schwickershausen plus the largest aerospace exhibition 

three years ago: ten-thousand digits, danger signs, the Goring Gap plus more links to enjoy

four years ago: a banger from Tina Turner plus legibility and semi-vowels

five years ago: an attempt was made with AI for a mash-up, the Carrington Event (1859), the Cod Wars (1958) even more links plus reskilling as a swan

six years ago: a Banksy-sponsored rescue boat, Church rejects modernism plus saints named Hyacinth 

splendor solis (13. 751)

The earliest version of the illuminated manuscript appearing in Augsburg around 1530, the alchemical guide with allegorical instructions on transmutational experiments is attributed to legendary Renaissance natural philosopher Salomon Trismosin and features rich illustrations by Albrecht Dürer, Lucas Cranach and Hans Holbein with a format comparable to a book of hours. According to the author’s own lore as laid out in a brief autobiography in a second volume attributed to him, Aureum Vellus (the Golden Parchment), Trismosin set out on a quest to find the true Philosopher’s Stone after observing a miner called Flocker transform lead into gold but took the secret to his grave. Encountering only charlatans during his search, Trismosin finally met a genuine alchemist in Venice, a fellow German seeker called Tauler, who taught him the rudiments of preparing the Stein der Weisen (Lapis philosophorum). Producing precious metals, however, was a rather basic trick when it came to wielding its power, which was said to be able to imbue bodily rejuvenation as the panacea or even immortality, and Trismosin is said to have then travelled East to unlock its further secrets. Early Renaissance surgeon Paracelsus encountered Trismosin in Constantinople where he was mentored in the arts of alchemy himself. The text does not contain the recipe but rather the process of discovery that one has to be willing to submit to comprehend humanity’s place in the natural world—the symbolism of the imagery is unknown, perhaps lost on us novices—but may, read with the text provide a key to esoteric alchemical reaction. Much more from Open Culture at the link above—which although most appreciative of the introduction, the way on the main page it bleeds into the previous article about how AI companies are buying and shredding antique books without a break gave us a little scare that The Splendour of the Sun had already been consigned to the woodchipper as well.

8x8 (13. 740)

and so on and so on and scooby-dooby-dooby: Kermit the Frog joins Dolly Parton for a 1987 appearance on her variety show, performing a duet of “Every Day People”  

young artists after siamesas 1960: US state department orders removal of woke Kehinde Wiley painting (previously) at the Dominican embassy  

pyramid of tirana: a survey of Albania’s built environment spanning sixty years—see previously  

ilulissat icefjord: bracing and heartbreaking timelapse of an iceberg collapsing and rolling over in west-central Greenland—see also 

synodical months: the cultural context of the upcoming August Sturgeon Moon—see previously   

restoration architecture: explore Copenhagen’s urban reform initiatives to conserve its landmarks for sustainable tourism whilst preserving the city’s heritage and character  

free press: Pentagon fires editor-in-chief, dismisses a reporter of independent military newspaper Stars & Stripes following an earlier overhaul to rid the publication of woke distractions 

imagination library: Dolly Parton, giver of books

8x8 (13. 736)

a comparison using like or as: a treasury of simile and metaphor from Ross MacDonald’s private detective Lew Archer 

mario v pareto: a scrolly-telling illustration of efficiency and optimisation—via Quantum of Sollazzo   

siamese wins: Thailand avoided colonisation through diplomacy and cultural synthesis  

world famous gopher hole museum: a visit to an usual tourist attraction in a tiny Albertan hamlet  

biblioclasm: Amazon’s AI book-pulping division has a cartoonish evil logo 

count coudenhove-kalergi: the Austro-Japanese politician and diplomat who championed the movement of European integration and was the inspiration for the character of Victor Laszlo in Casablanca—plus nominated Ode to Joy as the theme for the united continent 

balloon banjo: a 3D printed heuristic tool for experimenting with acoustics  

ounce dice trice: a garland ring of unusual words that ends up where it starts out

synchronoptica

one year ago: assorted links to revisit (with synchronoptica) plus a cache of vintage picture postcards

two years ago: a quick weekend get-away plus the Formosa Straits crisis of 1958 

three years ago: the US Republican primary debates plus more links to enjoy 

four years ago: even more links plus Ukraine re-establishes itself as an independent state (1991)  

five years ago: assorted links worth the revisit, ant architecture plus Bohemian Rhapsody (1975)

six years ago: cocktails for remote learning, superlative garden photographs plus re-sampling Soviet pop

the power and the glory (13. 727)

Courtesy of Strange Company, we learn about writer Graham Greene’s self-exile to Mexico (see previously here, here and here) and how the author’s visit to a country he held in contempt for research on religious persecution (see above), supposedly, was prompted in part by a libel suit leveraged against him by the legal team of child actor Shirley Temple Black after Greene intimated that her on-screen persona was crafted for the titilation of men of a certain age or certain ecclesiastical occupations, conveniently safe from prosecution outside of the court’s jurisdiction. The objective of gathering materials for a novel, expanded into a travelogue and two books that turn out to be historical fictions, transformed into a multi-year odyssey through Tabasco and Chiapas.

 

synchronoptica

one year ago: Trump’s campaign of retribution goes after former national security advisor John Bolton (with synchronoptica) plus the splintering of the internet

two years ago: GPS epochs plus a potential violation of the Logan Act

 

three years ago: assorted links worth the revisit

four years ago: the state song of Idaho, more links to enjoy plus social media driven overtourism

five years ago: Petra discovered (1812), a Saturnine satellite, even more links plus educational books for precocious witches and warlocks

six years ago: the canine Saint Guinefort,  i lik the bred plus Ray Bradbury (*1920)

house elf (13. 702)

We‘ve heard of several road construction projects diverted or completely derailed in Iceland to avoid encroaching on the dwellings of supernatural beings according to local lore. We learn, however—and not for the first time, fans of the Harry Potter franchise have successfully petitioned to reroute a multimillion pound energy project linking County Wexford in the Republic of Ireland with a pebbly beach in Pembrokeshire, Wales, which would have cut through the shrine to the memory of the fictional familiar Dobby.

The submarine copper cables connecting the Republic of Ireland to the UK national grid, following a rather massive outcry, was shifted to avoid the memorial—though in the process could possibly have damaged an archaeological site, an actual Bronze Age tomb with grave goods not fully excavated and conserved.

go tell aunt rhody (13. 694)

We have very much enjoyed this curation and appreciation from The Art Room Plant on author and illustrator Aliki Brandenberg. Graduating from the Philadelphia Museum School of Art, Aliki (usually going by her mononym) had a brief stint as commercial graphic designer and founded her own greeting card company before in 1956 returning to Europe to explore her Greek heritage, meeting Swiss native Franz Brandenberg—eventually marrying—and inspired to write her first children’s book on the legend of William Tell, the expert archer of Switzerland.
Well received, her first publication in 1960 started a long career adapting fables and myths with other works on a broad range of topics from her personal life, dinosaurs to Shakespeare. The pictured illustrations are from My Hands and The Listening Walk with Paul Showers of the “Let’s Read and Find Out” series.  Much more at the link above.

there will come soft rains (13. 687)

Notwithstanding a 1997 retcon of the author’s canon that advanced the future time settings by thirty-one years, unconvinced of his prescience, the title of Ray Bradbury’s 1950 short story is taken from a poem by Sarah Teasdale published at the end of World War I and the beginning of the influenza pandemic of 1918, takes place on this day. It chronicles a lone automated home that by chance survived the destruction of Allendale California in a nuclear attack. Daily routines continue with robots attending to household chores and meal preparation, acknowledging their former residents and masters though they mistake their presence for silhouettes burnt on to the walls by the atomic blast. The absent family’s pet dog, starving is blocked from entering the kitchen whilst the systems are whirring away, eventually dying of hunger and exhaustion before being unceremoniously incinerated by the clean-up module. The house recites a selection of the hostess’ favourite poetry, choosing the above. Later an errant wind gust blows a branch through the kitchen windows, causing a fire that the robots are unable to extinguish with the house itself consumed, save for a single wall and an automated clock, registering the date and time.

 

synchronoptica

one year ago: a UFO sighting in Scotland (with synchronoptica), UNESCO status for Neapolitan pizza, battling gerrymandering with gerrymandering plus a celebrity sea anemone 

 

two years ago: Trump refuses to debate Harris plus assorted links to revisit

 

three years ago: more links to enjoy plus Sir Arthur Conan Doyle channels a dead president

 

four years ago: the invention of champagne, the Zone of Avoidance plus even more links worth revisiting

 

five years ago: an ingenious Cold War bugging device, the Lady of Elx, a series of tubes plus con-man affiliates

 

six years ago: the Feast of Saint Sezni, more miniatures from Tatsuya Tanaka plus White House press corps journalist Helen Thomas