good housekeeping

Regular visitors may have noticed a few minor imrpovements and new features added to PfRC over the past few weeks. I hope that they’ve made this old blog a little better. I am happy to announce our fancy new, high-rent virtual address: one can now access this site via perfectforroquefortcheese.org (there goes the neighbourhood), but no fear, as all the old rants, postcards, post-scripts and randomness has transitioned over as well. I hope you enjoy. If you have any house-proud tips or advise, in lieu of house-warming gifts, please do not hesitate to share and thanks for stopping by.

among others

I don’t know why exactly I forsook reading science-fiction—although admittedly I did not have much of a literary foundation to spring from. I did read the Dune saga and A Canticle for Lebowitz and enjoyed them immensely—especially as the later was partially set in a post-apocalyptic Texarkana, where I was living at the time, per-apocalypse.

And although I did see the film adaptation of the former first, the story was so big and so well detailed, there was plenty of material left to explore in order to fully limn that universe. I suppose my mistake was in repairing to movies and franchise books that chronicled different aspects of a canon that was no so rich and immersive to begin with. Myth sometimes acquiesces to being frozen in carbonate—and I suppose it was a terribly snobbish attitude to take, not being willing to delve more into the genre, good or mediocre, but I harboured a dislike for the ilk I presumed to read science-fiction, and so probably condemned the whole parnassus, unfairly perceiving a tediousness like I felt for those who subscribed to the whole Che Guevara, peacenik or taoist iconography—movements that surely do not merit the disdain of a bumper-sticker. In fact, I felt a little embarassed to share some of my own proclivities as a loyal watcher of Star Trek, in all its incarnations, or the X-Files. I had, not long ago, a sort of belated wakening, however, when I was introduced to the author Jo Walton, who took my hand with allegory and direct-references through a grand gallery of sympathetic and imaginative writers. I realise that I have a lot of catching up to down, like staring down the exciting abyss of what’s undone and what’s giddily awaiting to be discovered, and began with Ursula K. Le Guin, a godmother of the genre who’s unfailing with her keen philosophic ideas and guarded allegory that’s us—but also something quite elevating.

mead hall or on tap

Via Colossal, comes a really brilliant bee-keeping set up, perfect for urban environments and for those maybe too skittish to be bee-wranglers, that harvests the honey by means of specially designed plumbing that allows it to flow, overcoming its great viscosity, from the comb under the force of gravity, like tapping maple sap for syrup production, and with minimal intrusion to the hive. I wonder if this trend of in situ condiments might spread, to something surpassingly fresh—or branch out in other directions, perhaps harnessing the natural preservative properties of nectar as a staple ingredient in for short-order items or make fresh mead (honey-wine) bars as popular as juice bars. Be sure to check out the link for more details and a demonstration of the system.

five-by-five

grand hotel paradox: a TED talk thought-puzzle on the nature of infinity

symmetry group: stunningly uniform modern architectural façades in a Turkish neighbourhood

echo parque: there is a popular attraction in Mexico that simulates the dangers of illegal border crossing

reinventing the wheel: a small collection of ingeniously useful and essential medieval apps

ramifications: happy lunar new year

barbary states

I think I must just be a little naïve, because although I never felt that the threat that the Caliphate poses was not a very real one, proved wrenchingly cruel and callous but not potent many times over, though shock and determination which can sometimes make up for other shortcomings for a little while—and when it seemed their violence had reached a sort of plateau, unspeakably gruesome reports come that ISIL may be harvesting the bodily organs of its victims to sell on the black-market—I never saw the potential for Rome and the Vatican to become prime targets, but I suppose they always were. ISIL is gaining territory in Libya—the former Italian colony on just the other side of the Mediterranean. Taking advantage of the power-vacuum created with the overthrow of strongman Qaddafi, whom had ambitions for creating a superstate across the Maghreb as well, the group is finding another staging ground in a leaderless land, like that American mandate, Iraq, that’s also proved to be vulnerable over its vacuity in leadership. They’ll be no defenders forthcoming for that past peerage of dictators, but destabilising order, especially a tyrannical one, has consequences.

five-by-five

gotham drowing: a projection of New York City under a hundred feet of water

alternate history: new serial adaptation of the Philip K. Dick classic, The Man in the High Castle, is in the making

lady liberty: Bartholdi’s iconic statue was originally intended to commemorate the opening of the Suez Canal on the Red Sea

through the looking glass: Physics Girl illustrates how mirrors work

sea monkey kingdom: the diminutive horseshoe shrimp is one of the oldest species on earth

cowboys and indians: side-show

A word or two more on the quite disastrous dress-rehearsal that preceded the commencement of the opening act: Urban II was not quite alone in stirring up furor, but surely the Pope’s summons inspired all the other holy-recruiters. The group that managed to get themselves, mostly, massacred in Anatolia, however, probably did not need to be enticed, over-much, to leave behind the drudgery of the manor to secure a blessing in a distant land, maybe even the Holy Land, which they understood to be the land of milk and honey. Being the first wave to embark on their crusade, the peasant army had easy going at first, but soon ran into complications.  Urban II orchestrated the details of the adventure carefully, delaying departure until after the autumn harvest, so the rear-detachment that kept the home-fires burning, already having lost a good deal of their manpower to the advance-party, would not be without food during the winter and the Crusaders might encounter farmers with their lagers full and would be willing to share their bounty.
 Aside from the awful mission-creep that excused the marchers to torment the Jews (which the nobility also championed though not condoned by the Church), it also apparently became license for indiscriminate pillaging and violence, plundering everything in their wake as they crossed the frontier into Byzantium, murdering any one who crossed them, even before the reached total desperation with their supplies dwindling, the local being left with little to share with the advancing horde, the summertime being the leanest season a thousand years ago, as the afore-mentioned crops had not matured and last year’s harvest was nearly depleted. By the time the rabble arrived in Constantinople, under escort, the Emperor Alexius was rather at a loss for words, as this group of untrained hooligans was not exactly the calvary he’d asked the Pope to send. In fact, camped outside the city walls while the emperor tried to figure out how to manage this influx, this relief army proved a much greater liability and terrorised the countryside even more than the occasional, more scrupulous raids carried out by the Turks and Normans—another desperate group of restless plunders suffering from mission-creep. Given a target in Turkish-controlled territory, the peasants decamped and were more or less summarily dispatched, but not without leaving an important blemish—not on the Crusades really since there are no winners in this exercise but on humanity. A few of the peasants even defected, as it were, to the other side, not that as if their convictions had not been tossed away long ago, and fight to expel the Byzantine Greeks. Once the professional crusaders came through months later, following the same route along the Danube to reach the Levant via Anatolia, they were regarded with great suspicion, locals fearing more of the same trouble and disappointment, and the Crusaders faced mounting resistance when it came to provisioning. Moreover, the Seljuk Turks assumed when the encountered this new army that it would be as handily rebuffed as the previous mob.

spread-eagle

Looking at the cover of the latest edition of an environmental publication that I receive from time to time, I was immediately reminded of the way that the best-preserved fossilised examples of the fabled archeopteryx are framed and thought that this posing pigeon meant to call for their preservation also.

It’s just a funny coincidence, I suppose, and a gentle reminder that even the most innovative and integrated among us can face the same fate, and without even the courtesy of being fawned over by future generations.