five-by-five

bio-pic: beautifully haunting animation style of pioneer Lotte Reiniger

phew-phew: supercut of the Foley artist sounds of Star Wars, including some effects that didn’t make the cut

zener cards: minimalist deck by Joe Doucet

tee-total: the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development wants Germany to curb its drinking-habit

tiger beat: social media giant promotes snap articles to journalism industry desparate to maintain young readership

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