The government of president Andrรฉs Manuel Lรณpez Obrador has declared a clowder of nineteen feral cats that have free range of the palatial executive complex grounds to be “living fixed assets”—part of the furniture like the official mouser of 10 Downing Street—but the first animals to be bestowed with the investment term that obligates the country’s treasury to feed and care for them for the rest of their lives. With no area off limits to the gatos palicios and the felines often making cameos during press conferences and escorting staff and visitors, they have become a symbol associated with the presidency and beloved by tourists—but one suspects that the population, especially after this development, won’t stay at this level for long.
Saturday 13 April 2024
Monday 18 March 2024
7x7 (11. 435)
deadwooding: Banksy acknowledges authorship of a new mural bringing back some greenery to an aggressive prune tree in Finsbury Park
subspace: an ultra high-definition video of a cat chasing a laser-pointer was beamed over thirty million kilometres to improve future video calls to the Moon and Marsrunning-stitch: beautiful embroidered portraits from Karola Pezarro
deadspin: more on the internet’s undead, reanimated by private equity and name recognition—see previously, see more
bunga bunga: Italy’s Foreign Press Association to move into former home of Silvio Berlusconi, who famously disparaged reporters as Communists
honeytrap: Aphra Behn’s intersecting careers as a professional writer and spy
sequoiadendron giganteum: imported by the Victorians as status symbols, Giant Redwoods (see also) are thriving in the UK at more than half-a-million and growing
Saturday 17 February 2024
8x8 (11. 358)
compound interest: Trump’s accumulated lawsuits amount to over half a billion dollars
vivi o preferibilmente morti: Poseidon’s Underworld reviews a 1969 Spaghetti Western
epistolary doll: Kafka, a little girl and her beloved, lost toy—via the New Shelton wet/drythe wonderful night of hercules brown: a 1968 short film guiding a young boy through his dreams with the help of muppets and puppets
millions of cats: Wanda Hazel Gรกg’s 1928 children’s book—the oldest American title still in print
leaning toward more grasshopper, less ant: raising children on the eve of the AI revolution—via tmn
hero’s journey: a video poking fun at the tropes and archetypes of found in every epic quest—see previously
never surrender high-tops: Trump launches gold trainers line, goes public with his social network in order to earn cash to pay for his legal judgments—see previously
Tuesday 6 February 2024
8x8 (11. 328)
the scholar & his cat: a resonant ninth century reflection by Pangur Bรกn
bring your own beach owl: mimicry and semi-automated genre fiction—via Kottkeriverwalk: a one kilometre-long museum that undulates with the reservoir it crosses in Shandong province
steelmaster: a 1966 office furniture catalogue
television stone: the unique optical properties of the mineral ulexite
๐️: the Eames Archive open to the public—see previously
vesuvius challenge: a trio of researchers share the honorarium for deciphering charred scrolls from Herculaneum with the help of AI
ombre: Alexander Pope’s card game
synchronoptica
one year ago: Facebook’s social engineering experiments plus a ska version of the Tetris theme
two years ago: multiple zoom maps, Computerwelt, Sesame Street light jazz plus assorted links to revisit
three years ago: quotation marks, Zardoz (1974), more links to enjoy, the founding of Liberia, I Ching in melting snow plus barbarian tongues
four years ago: Deciminisation Days, Trump acquitted, classical architecture plus photographer Eliza Ruhamah Scidmore
five years ago: Anguilla independence, the Irish border, dress uniforms plus Orson Welles on creeping intolerance
Saturday 20 January 2024
dropcat (11. 282)
hough easily accomplished with publishing and word processing software—adding epigraphic letters or initials (from the Latin intialis, meaning that which goes first), the dropcap poses particular challenges for web typesetters, we learn via Good Internet, between scaling and kerning. And while not completely typographically satisfying (but it’s our feline friends so willing to overlook a few gaps in formatting in this exacting science), this experiment to generate figurated majuscule headers with AI illustrates how challenging it can be to get a font, wrapping and layout right—and although automated and tailorable, printers and sorters are not obsolete. Much more about about the methodology and the chance to create one’s own typeface Gwern at the link above.
Friday 22 December 2023
copycat (11. 205)
Born on this day in 2001, the product of a collaboration between researchers at Texas A&M (Agricultural and Mechanical College) University and Genetic Savings & Clone, Inc, a brown tabby kitten called CC was the world’s first clone pet. A demonstration project to see if it was commercially viable and safe, CC—pictured with her genetic donor, Rainbow (bottom centre), displays an interesting discrepancy in the calico pattern due to random differences in tortoiseshell phenotypes from epigenetic re-programming on implantation (having dispensed with the usual determinants of fertilisation), lived a healthy and happy life, a perfectly normal feline giving birth to her own litter of kittens in 2006, dying aged eighteen years in March of 2020, still residing in the laboratory in College Station with her human caretakers.
Friday 15 September 2023
9x9 (11. 002)
you deserve to sit: a comedian’s silly song about their favourite inactivity
๐ธ: visit a random feline friend featured on Wikipedia—via Pasa Bon!
& let it stonde .1. nyght or .2.: a medieval recipe for meadmontage: the animated collages of Alice Issac
shrinkflation: a French supermarket chain displaying advisory labels to alert consumers
word alienation and semantic satiation: one of the laureates of the thirty-third Ig Noble Awards—see also here and here
consult our extensive archives: veteran broadcaster—and BBC’s first podcaster, Melvyn Bragg celebrates one thousand episodes
pagliacci: a pizza chef turns melodramatic over a cursed request
synchronoptica
one year ago: Our Lady of Sorrows plus assorted links to revisit
two years ago: forest mascots (1971) plus a Star Trek: TAS classic
three years ago: more Trek with “Amok Time,” illustrations from the children of Charles Darwin, rousing public sentiment following the Gunpowder Plot, life signs on Venus plus a COVID movie-night
four years ago: more on Jupiter’s moons, a hot Colonel Sanders, public crucifixes, Lovecraft in the style of Dr Seuss plus Graphis Press
five years ago: an AI names apples, the Ig Noble Awards, the Great Recession’s Lost Decade plus legalising marijuana confounded by travel regulations
Saturday 19 August 2023
8x8 (10. 951)
egress: the oldest door in Britain, a side-entrance to Westminister Abbey—via Strange Company
hold on to my fur: another collaboration with the Kiffness—this time with a talkative orange cat from China
isokon estate: Lawn Road Flats housed those displaced by WWII and its share of espionage
i want to believe: vintage UFO photos taken by Eduard Albert “Billy” Meier in Switzerland in the mid-70s made iconic when featured on the X-Files up for auction—via Things Magazinemeow-practise: a limited-run series in the tradition of American day-time soap opera classics like General Hospital and All My Children but with a feline twist
countdown: both Russia and India have Moon missions next week with the goal of being the first to reach the lunar south pole—via Super Punch
no dark sarcasm in the classroom: impressively, researchers recreate Pink Floyd’s “Another Brick in the Wall” by analysing listeners’ brain scans but we wonder—like in the above duet—there isn’t an element of backmasking and suggestion—via Kottke
ingress: the oldest known cat door at Exeter Cathedra
synchroptica
one year ago: the daguerrotype process is gifted to the world (1839)
two years ago: the Ninety-Five Theses as an email, the Treaty of Rawalpindi (1919) plus the Lithuanian sun goddess
three years ago: the launch of Sputnik 2 (1960) plus the album cover art of Milton Glaser
four years ago: more Brexit omnishambles plus the Pan-European Picnic of 1989
five years ago: assorted links to revisit
Sunday 6 August 2023
i don’t listen hard—i don’t pay attention to the distance that you’re running (10. 928)
Originally conceived in 1990 with the intent of selling it to Hall and Oates for an anthology album, “Stay” (I Missed You) by Lisa Loeb & Nine Stories (named after the J D Salinger collection of short fiction) as the lead single from the Reality Bites soundtrack—included in the scoring after neighbour and friend Ethan Hawke heard the song and recommended it to the film’s director Ben Stiller—began a three-week run at number one on the US charts on this day in 1994. The below accompanying music video, that completes the piece’s status as an artefact of a very specific time—running over the movie’s end credits—was shot in Loeb’s New York apartment and features Hawke’s cat, Mardot, who also directed the video. So I turned the radio on—I turned the radio up.
synchronoptica
one year ago: the dissolution of the Holy Roman Empire (1806) plus assorted links to enjoy
two years ago: Klaus Nomi, the banners of the Akan people, Olympic trivia plus unworthy subjects
three years ago: more street photography, anime Spongebob plus some poorly translated Latin
four years ago: a Martian meteorite, highly agglutinative languages plus more on endlings, the last of their kind
five years ago: more links worthy of a revisit, the US Voting Rights Act (1965), Japanese terms for rain plus more computer cameos
Wednesday 28 June 2023
10x10 (10. 840)
⚫️ ⚫️ ⚫️ ⚫️ ⚫️ ⚫️ ⚫️ ⚫️ ⚫️ ⚫️: Neal Fun’s (previously) infuriating password game
ceiling cat: the European Souther Observatory in the Chilean mountains discovered a feline nebula
bad odds: wagering on climate change to bring the danger and risk to present and personal
backstage: newsletters (from 1962 to 1980) published for Disneyland crew members, scanned in full—via Super Punch
homage to magritte: a 1974 tribute in five vignettes to the Surrealist artistindependent legislature theory: US Supreme Court strikes down suit that would cut checks and balances and judicial review of laws passed
monkey bars: the first jungle gym (see previously) was built in hopes of teaching children about three-dimensional space and Cartesian coordinates
magma: mining volcanoes could provide a more ecologically-friendly way to extract metals
power of ten: NASA’s coding commandments focused on testability, readability and predictability that keeps critical systems safe and running in outer space
goodnight phone: an interactive web comic for our shared present—via tmn
synchronoptica
one year ago: assorted links to revisit plus a surprise session of the January Sixth hearings on the US Capitol Insurrections
two years ago: body language, the UN International Criminal Court (1993), Miss Continuous Towel and other spokesmodels plus Pitman shorthand
three years ago: a corporate typeface, a performative masculine simulator game, Martian meteors plus cataloguing one’s possessions
four years ago: the Stonewall Riots (1969), surveying Titan plus bringing back the chestnut tree
five years ago: Paul Simon on Sesame Street, silent cooking videos, assorted links to revisit plus combating fake product reviews
Wednesday 21 June 2023
8x8 (10. 825)
the restaurant of mistaken orders: a pop-up establishment in Japan serves a lesson in compassion along with its dishes
specimens of fancy turning: these late nineteenth century lathe patterns look like spirographs
dwarf fortress: an interview with the author of 50 Years of Text Games—see previouslymercurial: more on the found and lost planet Vulcan
monk parakeets: over a decade living in Wiesbaden, these invasive birds went from rare, doubtful sightings to absolute flocks
area sacra: assassination site of Caesar and since taken over by semi-feral cats opening to the public
รฑ: the origins of the letter with a diacritical tilde
evergreen appeal: once considered dire sustenance only, pine-based cuisine in Nordic countries is becoming fine-dining
Thursday 18 May 2023
6x6 (10. 749)
unartificial: city of Vienna is using AI feline-added artwork to promote its inspiration—via Miss Cellania
paved paradise: the American obsession with car storage and its attendant illsworld police: US military bases around the globe—see previously here and here
sour grapes: the art of the sulk as a form of indirect communication and social-leveller
bakerloo line: an incredible schematic of the Piccadilly Circus under- and overground by Renzo Picasso—see previously
uhohlingo: a AI that generates language learning lessons—and tends to be notoriously wrong
Friday 17 March 2023
9x9 (10. 614)
telegeography: the current map of submarine cables connecting the world
blogoversary: a belated birthday greeting to Fancy Notions
rightish: Microsoft touts AI’s factual errors as “usefully wrong”
goldenes buch: German communities’ official, historic guest logs are a chronicle of the times and Zeitzeugnissemedia matters: if journalists cannot call out propaganda—what’s even the the point of coverage—via Kottke
gวutรณu mฤo nรญng—literally dog’s head, cat’s meow: cute Chinese animal transcriptions for English salutations
seoul ring: the world’s largest spokeless ferris wheel being built in South Korea
linkrot: more thoughts on three broken links and internet conservation
mappa mundi: the thirteenth century chart of the mundane and exalted—see previously
Saturday 18 February 2023
8x8 (10. 555)
konekon no rakugaki: an imaginative 1957 cartoon from the studios that would become Toei Animation
the riddle of today: Nelson Riddle’s “Sunshine Superman” and other tracks
the six-triple-eight: the WWII all Black, all female postal battalion—via Strange Companythe remorse of professor panebianco: a selection of short fiction one can read from its annals for the centenary (today) of Weird Tales—see previously
ai mirror test: misattributing software for sentience to review before exploring this two-hour conversation with a robot interlocutor—via Waxy
80s cold war techno thriller: the trailer for a Tetris movie—see previously, see also
secondhand songs: an exploration of original versions upstaged by later covers—via the Awesomer
my green crocodile: a 1966 stop-motion Soyuzmultfilm
Friday 3 February 2023
6x6 (10. 519)
good boy: a thirty year old dog in Portugal beats a century-old record for oldest in the world
bb-8: a small security robot that rolls about the premiseseternity’s pillar: late night variety show produced by Turiyasan-gitananda—see previously
studio fong leng: a look at the Dutch fashion designer who dressed Kate Bush and socialite Mathilde Willink
can’t do hands: an atrocious sign language guide imaged by an AI—see previously
catgpt: a feline version of the scarily smart chat bot—via Waxy
Tuesday 24 January 2023
8x8 (10. 495)
super 8: Kodak background orchestral ensemble for home movies (1961) would make a good soundtrack for any clip
memory hole: unearthing—with surprising difficulty—an iconic, defining moment of 90s US political pop culture
the fourth plinth: what becomes of statuary exhibited temporarily in Trafalgar Square—via Things Magazinewhw: an interview with the ousted Kunsthalle collective who wanted to showcase all sides of Vienna
poissons de diverses couleurs et figures extraordinaires: exquisite disco fish (1719)
geyser relays: a rather pie-in-the-sky proposal for irrigation using a series of water canons
parade route: revisiting the would-be arrival and presentation of Ganda the Rhinoceros
sympawny № 4: a short arrangement to pay tribute to a beloved cat
Tuesday 13 December 2022
9x9 (10. 381)
deep field: JWST scans the skies
mar1d: in-game action as our protagonist would experience the Mushroom Kingdom—like Flatland—via Kottke
ny๐ณ: the City’s popular tree map updated to include a hundred thousand park residents—via Map Roomeven a cat can look at the queen: an exhibition of fine feline art
tumbleword: a daily challenge from Jer Thorp—via Waxy
math and the mechanics: the surprising origin story of the Cura Calculator
cervoise: brewer informed by ancient herbal and unhopped beer predecessor
world in motion: New Order’s 1990 World Cup anthem—via Digg
splash down: Artemis’ Orion capsule (previously) returns after a perfectly executed trial run
Tuesday 29 November 2022
quantum superimposition (10. 343)
Devised by Erwin Schrรถdinger with interlocutor Albert Einstein as a thought experiment and refined and published on this day in 1935 in the monthly journal Naturwissenschaften (The Science of Nature), a hypothetical feline is suspended between life and death—both simultaneously—its fate linked to a random and subatomic change that may or may not happen. Motivated to point out the counterintuitive and paradoxical nature of the prevailing theory, called the Copenhagen Interpretation that holds that a quantum system (an atom or a photon that can act both like a particle or like a wave) remains in a state of being added together until it interacts with or is observed by the external world. Although intended as a rebuke of the current understanding of quantum mechanics, others have extended this idea of alive-dead cat as a manifestation of the effects of vanishingly small changes on a macroscopic Cosmos and construe from it the Many-Worlds (alternate realities) interpretation application of the branch of physics. It is a matter of fundamental debate whether measurement or observation causes such a juncture to collapse into one state or another or both continue to exist but are decoherent from each other, splitting into separate universes. A “cat state” has been produced in the laboratory for short periods on collections of electrons and ions as well as in quantum computing.
Friday 28 October 2022
unblogged crete (10. 254)
A few bits of miscellaneous reflections on traveling in Crete that didn’t quite fit elsewhere: Like the German practise of erecting crosses at the roadside to memorialise a tragic death in an auto accident, in Greece, they use these miniature concrete churches, often with a small shrine inside to those lost and are mass-produced.
There are cats everywhere that belong to no one and will congregate around one at a restaurant, and generally have very good table manners and will not beg or harass but will sit quietly and mildly look at you. Far more intense and immersive than a cat cafe, only once when we were the sole guests at a criminally under-partonized establishment did they bother us, until an older woman riding a motorbike arrived and with distinctFriday 21 October 2022
meow-mix (10. 244)
Friend of the blog Nag on the Lake treats us to a unique operatic interlude in “Duetto buffo di due gatti”—that is, a comic duet for two cats, which consists of miau sung in two parts with piano. Often performed as a concert encore, some credit Gioachino Rossini, who composed The Barber of Seville and dozens of other operas, but authorship is uncertain. More at the link above.