mason-dixon or white-sale

I always considered the US federal holiday, known as Presidents’ Day, to be a pretty anodyne concession to something akin to the monarch’s birthday (usually shifted to the summer months, irrespective of the actual date of birth of the reigning royal to increase the chances of nicer weather) but it’s actually quite politically and grammatically contentious, rather than the monolithic excuse for discounts for towels and bedding that bespeak patriotism.
Originally celebrated as George Washington’s birthday only, Abraham Lincoln—also born in February—was added later, though many jurisdictions did not get as far as adopting the correct orthography in moving from president’s to presidents’ and many States, especially those that suffered under the War of Northern Aggression still honour Thomas Jefferson (born in April) instead of Lincoln or choose it as a day to honour the office and no specific office-holder. Uniquely, Arkansas chooses to toast Washington and a civil rights activist, Daisy Lee Gatson Bates (born and passed away in the month of November) on this day for her pivotal actions during the Little Rock schools integration crisis on the late 1950s. Yet other states do their own thing entirely to supplement that national mandate. Ironically, with the passage of the act that moved all federal holidays to Mondays in the early 1970s, proclamation Presidents’ Day to be held on the third Monday of February, the observance can never fall on Washington’s actually birth date of 22 February.

sweded or my angel is a centerfold

Reminding me of the story about how Tom’s Diner by Susanne Vega became the first .mp3, I enjoyed reading this essay in The Atlantic about the unwitting and for quite a long time unknown contribution and legacy of a Miss Lena Sjööblom (all very safe-for-work) of Sweden, the Playmate of the Month for November 1972 toward the .jpeg digital photographic processing and compression format.
Researchers working on the project to create portable images of manageable sizes yet without perceptible loss in visual quality for the agency that would become DARPA, the team grabbed the first clipping handy that might fit on the small surface of their drum-scanner and began trying different techniques on the cropped centerfold. Not to dismiss the objectifying nature of the team’s subject which speaks of the barriers to entry for women in computer-sciences, I suppose having a test-pattern such as this helped them monitor when different mathematical models degraded the image’s quality beyond an acceptable threshold, not wanting it to get too pixilated. Although the standard is usually something taken for granted now, it allows for quick transfer through the æther (even telemetry from space) and across devices and the ability to store massive amounts of images—and not only the kind these researchers might have kept under their mattresses.

infructescense

Thanks to Swiss Miss’ Friday link rodeo, we learn that pineapples and mulberries—among others—are not single fruits but rather an aggregate or collective fruit—a cluster of individual berries fused together. I suppose, however, when one considers the whole spectrum of the cornucopia from a shaft of wheat, an ear of maize, a bunch of grapes to a lone budding apple or cherry—and is around to watch one’s orchard grow—it ought not be all that strange to think about, but still I was a little overwhelmed to find out about the assorted strategies of produce.

topiary

I first encountered those beautiful wool rugs whose landscaped pile evokes pastures and soft clumps of hearty grass on the fabulous Everlasting Blört, but then I began noticing the same sort of floor-covering by artist Alexandra Keyayoglou all over the place, and not just on-line. I am not sure if it’s incident to the very mild Winter and tepid thaw that’s been quite confusing for Nature, but there’s a lot of mossy patches on cobble-stones and roof tiles—more than usually, I think—that form the same contrasted and topographic. I know it’s the exact opposite phenomena, carpeting imitating Nature, but it makes me think of those coordinated yarn-bombing events when a brigade of knitters decide to decorate urban trees. I bet Keyayoglou’s rugs feel better between the toes, for the moment.

i drive a rolls royce, because it’s good for my voice

The always compelling Nag on the Lake invites to visit an expertly curated gallery, showing in London, of early 1970s political protest posters to come out of the workshop of the University of California’s Berkeley campus.
These bold and iconic posters really capture the Zeitgeist of distrust and dissolution that framed the era of Vietnam, Nixon and violent kettling of rallies, and the quality and artistry of these prints, incidentally, inspired some to believe that the peace-movement was backed by the Communists in order to corrupt the youth and overthrow the government. This conspiratorial belief only strengthened the hubris of the politicians in their thinking that they surely could not have genuinely engendered such disaffections on their own. There are some fifty posters to view but I especially liked this one that recalls Goya’s nightmare vision of the paranoid Titan Cronus (Saturn) devouring his offspring, the Olympian gods.

eros and agape

Valentine’s Day in its received format has a pretty interesting history of conflation, segregation and outright confusion. As the Roman Empire was filling its calendar with holidays, the day preceding the Ides of February became sacred to Juno (Hera), the long-suffering spouse of Jupiter (Zeus), who was among many other attributes and kennings, the patroness of marriage and newly-weds. Accordingly, this date began a favoured time for nuptials and young boys and girls, whom were normally strictly separated throughout the rest of the year, in anticipation for the coming feast distributed ballots, lots with their names on them and later—during the following feast of Lupercalia, pairs were drawn and the two youths would be “married” for the duration of the festivities before being parted again, to be later married off under more customary, strategic conditions arranged by their parents.
I do not know if any of these sweethearts pined afterwards but graver unimpassioned measures were to be introduced during the first decades of the three hundreds when, according to legend, there was a backlash against the recalcitrant Christian community, under the reign of Aurelian (and later repeated by Diocletian) who was distrusting of their anti-social behaviours in not observing the rites of the Empire and aside from tossing them to the lions forbade marriage (but this may have also been a more general-order, irrespective of affiliation) since matrimony was not conducive to going off to war. A hero was produced, as is often the case (and another during the Diocletian persecution with the same cognomen and guilty of the same crimes against the state), in the person of Valentino, who performed in cognito wedding services in accordance with Church customs. This underground community was infiltrated and an unrepentant Valentine (and his later incarnation) were thrown in prison. One of the Valentines had an audience with the Emperor (Claudius Gothicus, according to some) who was sympathetic to his cause at first, but the Valentine got a little too preachy and the Emperor had him executed anyway. Both martyrdoms took place at the head of Lupercalia and as a symbol for fidelity and family—though I suppose there could only be one Valentine with that sort of patronage. Though Valentine greetings were sent first in the late Middle Ages, it was not until Victorian times that the spirit of the holiday recaptured that original sense of the lottery and flirtation—and continued admiration. Happy Valentines’ Day everybody!

calling-card or oh snap

Assistant editor Rebecca O’Connell of the fabulously fascinating Mental Floss invites up to check out the printing and developing services of a company called Ubersnap, who will not only expertly transform one’s images to animations, they will go one further and create pseudo-holographic prints that leap out of their frames. This would be a pretty keen thing to experiment with—and not just for one’s candid bursts of photographs but for other applications, like business cards and other promotional materials, as well.  Mental Floss has further details, so give it a try.

tatort oder der kommissar’s in town

Though truthfully I cannot say I consider myself a dedicated fan of the series—though I usually have it on in the background and make it a point to gyrate to the funky opening soundtrack—I think that I must give it another go after reading Dangerous Minds’ appreciation of Tatort, a crime-scene investigatory franchise that has regular parallel plot-lines in a dozen different cities within the German Sprachraum. The series has aired for four decades presently and its thousandth instalment is coming up soon. The tribute highlights some of the best episodes and offers a lucid explanation to the nonpareil format to outside audiences—however much we might already fancy ourselves forensics experts thanks to CSI and Law & Order. I have caught glimpses of familiar sights in the show’s extensive venues, especially Leipzig, beforehand—and although a recent chapter was filmed between Frankfurt and Wiesbaden, I was a little let down that Wiesbaden’s screen-presence was severely limited and confined to an underground carpark—though I could be reasonably certain I recognised it.