grooks or squaring the circle

During the Nazi occupation of Denmark poly-math turned resistance-fighter by the name of Piet Hein published thousands (a body of some seven-thousand in his lifetime) of short, aphoristic poems that really went above the heads of their oppressors but were immediately understood and spread virally by the Danish people. Hein called these concentrated verses grooks (gruks, which Hein maintained was purely a nonsense word but some suggest it is a portmanteau of laugh plus sigh) and one particularly poignant one illustrates the heartbreak of conquest, vacillating between indecision, flight or taking up arms:

Consolation Grook

Losing one glove

is certainly painful,

but nothing

compared to the pain,

of losing one, throwing away the other,

and finding the first one again.

There are multitudes to discover on every subject and I am sure that anyone could find one that resonates.

Problems

Problems worthy of attack

prove their worth

by hitting back.

Or for the melancholy Dane, finding resolve when least expecting it:

A Psychological Tip

Whenever you're called on to make up your mind,

and you're hampered by not having any,

the best way to solve the dilemma,

you'll find, is simply by spinning a penny.

No -- not so that chance shall decide the affair

while you're passively standing there moping;

but the moment the penny is up in the air,

you suddenly know what you're hoping.

After the war, Hein continued to formulate grooks of course but also turned his attention to other word play in the form of language games and logic puzzles. Returning to his mathematical and engineering prowess, having mentally spared with Niels Bohr and other luminaries, Hein also devised an architectural compromise that embraced both the rectilinear and the round in the form of what’s called the superegg, which came to typify Scandinavian Mid-Century design and architecture.

lifecycle replacement or persistence of memory

The whole time I was enjoying Doug Dorst’s frame novel S, I did not realise that the subtitle, The Ship of Theseus, was itself a reference to a rather famous philosophical model.

Paradoxically, the ship of the legendary founder of Athens was maintained in a seaworthy state for generations after his death, according to a pledge to honour his memory, but with time and tide, rotten planks had to be replaced at regular intervals. Eventually, none of the original material would have remained, begging the question, posed by many quizzical minds, is the Ship of Theseus still the same ship if 99%, 90%, 50%, 5% or none of the parts were original and all had been replaced. Some argue yes and some no. Now understanding this allusion, the connection becomes quite apparent to the story. Though debatably, one cannot step into the same stream twice, Heraclitus believed that persistence, through the element, medium of time, projects identity outward, even if all the component parts—our bodies included, are continuously eroding and being replaced. What do you think? Is that rescued and refurbished jalopy the same classic car? Is it still Lenin who’s visited in his mausoleum, or now, as he lies in state, even more reliably and fixedly the man?

five-by-five

one ring to bind them: wonderfully geeky and romantic science-fiction inspired jewellery

swim-lanes: a vintage timeline of human history

dollies: beautiful lace patterns created out of newspaper collages

[edit]: audio landscape of revisions, additions to Wikipedia

ampelmännchen: in the run up to EuroVision, Vienna installs same sex couple cross-walk lights

der natur auf der spur oder welcome to the monkey-house

Over the weekend, H and I had the chance to take a safari through the storied and thoroughly progressive zoological gardens of Leipzig, about time too as we have been coming to the city regularly for year now.
Founded for the indemnifying of the public in 1878, the menagerie has expanded immensely in the last couple of decades as has the zoo’s mission for conservation and education.

Within the vastness of the traditional range (though there is nothing mundane about the innovative enclosures) that recreates the habitat of the happy captives as best as possible, there is an indoors core called Gondwanaland that captured the primordial supercontinent in a hot-house environment host to an amazing botanical, hanging garden home to free-range monkeys and birds and dozens of aquaria, madials and terrariums that represent the sort of evolutionary survivors, malingerers that might have populated the pre-tectonic world.
There was also expertly and exotically landscaped lagoons of flamingos, an expansive serengeti, a temple for elephants and many other installations (including ones featuring biomes closer to home) with amenities and little intrusion from those who come to gawk.
The zoo was no amusement park ride, nor side-show attraction but rather a powerful, interactive lesson in diversity and amazing adaptability of life that really confronts one with the vulnerability of our quirkiest, most-specialised cousins.
One of the most popular daily soap operas in Germany profiles resident animals and their caretakers and is broadcast from here every afternoon.  The whole day was hardly long enough for a proper visit and hope to come back soon to learn more.