save our saucepans

In the late 1950s, the American and Soviet governments agreed to hold expositions in each otherʼs capitals in order to promote cultural understanding by showcasing the best in technique and artistry in all arenas—including home economics—and one such model American kitchen was the backdrop (or rather the proscenium) for an impromptu debate between the then visiting vice-president, Richard Milhous Nixon, and the Soviet Premier Nikita Khrushchev in Sokolniki Park in the summer of 1959.
Box Vox introduces us to the exchange captured by television cameras and then simulcast in both nations and the produce-placement of the now iconic packages on the table and countertops, including the box of S.O.S soap pads. The two were touring the exhibits together—of a suburban home within the means of any American, when all of a sudden Khrushchev complained in strong terms how the US legislative characterised the Warsaw Pact as the Iron Curtain and Eastern Europe was not a prisoner. Taken aback, Nixon focused on the modern marvels in the kitchen and the labour-saving devices. Not impressed, Khrushchev asked where was the machine that would put the food in oneʼs mouth and force it down oneʼs throat. The two agreed that there was at least virtue in that the competition was couched in domestic terms, rather than military ones and that there scuffle ought to become a photo-op, given to the networks, in both the USA and USSR, to air a few days later.

see ʻn say

Working from Alexandria, Egypt, graphic design artist Mahmoud Tammam transforms Arabic script into the objects and concepts that the words represent. This is a clever way, I think, to diffuse a situation where some people might feel threatened by or scared of an unfamiliar alphabet.

guerra mundial

Via the always interesting Everlasting Blört comes the forgotten World War II artwork of Mexican anti-Axis Propaganda.
Though Mexicoʼs involvement in the war was a relatively brief one prompted in 1942 after a Nazi submarine attacked one of Mexicoʼs oil platforms and later dispatched fighter-jet pilots to the Philippines (I was pretty impressed to learn about the Aztec Eagles) the feelings portrayed in the poster were genuine due to having been betrayed and made the object of revile and suspicion beforehand by Germany. The so-called Zimmermann Telegraph was a leaked communique between the German consul and the government of Mexico that proposed an alliance between the two countries should the US decide to intervene in World War I, with the promise to help Mexico to reclaim territory in Texas, Arizona and New Mexico that the US annexed. America launched a punishing raid on Mexico in retaliation and harboured suspicions afterwards, even though it was unclear what Mexico thought of this arrangement.

peaceniks or hms semaphore

Hyperallergic invites us to see the original sketches of the symbol that would come to be adopted by peace movements around the world that will go on display at Londonʼs Imperial War Museum in March as part of larger exhibition. The symbol, designed by conscientious objector and artist Gerald Holtom in 1958, first appeared in public for a rally against the arms race of the Cold War and is itself stylised rendering of semaphore “letters” of the flag-signaling alphabet N and D for Nuclear Disarmament.

hubris and hyperbole or omnibus, omnishambles

It is really beyond the pale in multiple ways that if we relent, just for a portion of the news cycle (what does that even mean anymore?), there’s a whole raft of new evasive maneuvers and publicity stunts that bury the really critical stories and any reflection of what America is lurching towards and pulling the rest of the world with it is precluded. No world leader’s chief job ought to be forcing one to choose one’s battles—especially by issuing mixed-messages and being generally evasive and unpleasant. Regardless, it is astounding what can transpire over the course of a few days if one doesnʼt remain vigilant.
Thankfully it was a bit of premature reporting on behalf of the wires and the US wonʼt yet be deploying the National Guard to round-up immigrants and brown-skinned people, but enough has happened already this week, with this weekend expected to see a campaign rally in Florida for Dear Leader to reconnect with his base and supposedly announce his bid to run for an unthinkable second term in 2020: a climate-change skeptic was just confirmed to head the agency (also to be abolished) charged with protecting the environment. More aides at the State Department are dismissed as the chief ambassador and former oil executive attends his first summit abroad. Dear Leader has a rambling and unhinged press conference where the press is declared the enemy of the people, as the Attorney General is asked to recuse himself from any future investigations involving the administrationʼs ties to Russia because heʼs mired in it too. American intelligence agencies admit to withholding information from Dear Leader—underscoring deep distrust, and the presumptive Labour Secretary and former fast food magnate with a firmly ensconced aversion to fair and equitable labour policy had to withdraw his candidacy over employing an undocumented house-keeper. Dear Leader let the past three decades of work towards peace between Israel and Palestine implode with a few carelessly fawning words. The executive producer of the film Suicide Squad is named Secretary of the Treasury just after one cabinet member already on the job for nearly three weeks tendered his resignation for having held talks with his Russian counterparts prior to the inauguration and failing to inform senior leadership of those talks; illegal leaks, rather than gross misconduct or treason, are to blame. This list doesnʼt even include Russiaʼs ballistic missile test (after that other one) nor the ship apparently trawling the eastern seaboard to assess US naval strength and the bizarre assassination of the other Dear Leaderʼs half-brother in Indonesia, likely at his own order, and the renewed assault against public broadcasting.  This is only the first month, and naturally everything in this post could be out of date (or lost down a memory hole) by the time you read it.

earthenware

I’ve wondered before if the echo, imprint of every sound ever made wasn’t somehow embedded in the environment, to be subtly teased out by the right quiver of instruments and detectors, and now see that archaeologists have achieved something even more interesting that speculative acoustic conservation by studying the pottery shards of ancient civilizations.

Researchers found that ores mixed in with clay act as archive, a snap-shot of geomagnetic activity that was happening invisibly in the skies, except maybe as auroras, by cementing the orientation of the minerals when the clay is fired in the kiln. Clay and ceramics being produced at the present time, stretching back over aeons, all record the strength of the Earth’s magnetic field and represent an untapped chronicle of how the Earth has been protected from cosmic radiation and digging down through the strata of pottery fragments gives an indication of the periodicity of powerful spikes in the intensity of geomagnetic events, ones which may have been harmless in ancient times but which would now certainly disable the power grid and present an unimaginable disruption to the way we live.

heʼd let us in, knows where weʼve been in his octopusʼs garden in the shade

The alway interesting Kottke directs our attention to the winners and honourable mentions of the annual UK Underwater Photography competition. Especially striking was this ensemble of clown fish in the protective fronds of an Anemone (an octopus having taken top honour), which upon closer inspection reveals six sees of eyes beaming back at the camera. Thankfully, Finding Nemo spared audiences details on the other symbiotic relationship framed in this picture, the parasitic isopod that has attached itself to the tongue of the host fish and lives quite comfortable there in the fishesʼ mouths as a prosthetic one.

6x6

but they always land on their feet: gallery of brides tossing cats instead of bouquets

quantum of solace: an accessible primer on the starlit experiment that seems to suggest that we do not live in a predestined Cosmos

white monkey gig: a documentary about how foreigners were recruited to help market the Chinese building boom and subsequent bust

dii consentes: organic compounds discovered on asteroid belt dwarf planet Ceres

felis cattus: Mister Data’s sonnet to his pet cat, Spot

さくら: the cherry trees are in full blossom in the eastern Japanese town of Kawazu