alley oop

Though not the first or most famous of its class, learning that the mildly mysterious Coso Artefact was discovered on this date in 1961 by some rock-hounds in California’s Owens Valley did impel us into the strange and contentious realm of out-of-place archaeology. While prospecting for geodes, the group found a spark plug from the 1920s encased in a rock that was estimated to be a half-a-million years old.
Though geological processes could account for the concretion and nodule formation around the clear anachronism, proponents of time-travel, prehistoric alien visitation and lost civilisations of course carried the day—as they do for other anomalous found objects, deemed in the wrong chronological context, that are categorised as OOPArt (Out-of-Place Artefacts). While not all are haunted with the blight of pseudoscience and sometimes there is a honest misinterpretation, wishful-thinking or confirmation-bias over a pet theory, most claims are dubious and tend to be a demerit to human ingenuity and accomplishment, like the Nebra Skydisk or the Antikythera mechanism being the artifice of extra-terrestrials or even gods, pareidolia due to suboptimal inputs and of course outright forgeries and hoaxes meant to embarrass or strengthen an agenda or alternate point-of-view.

itineraria

Maps Mania directs us to a clever application that helps one create custom, emblematic metropolitan street map posters as a scalable vector format (SVG)—which admittedly has a level of flexibility and versatility in programming and dynamic displays that I did not appreciate until this introductory tutorial.
Admittedly too it’s a bit out of my league as well but the coding is not a necessity to play around with the tool and appreciate the patterns of traffic management and civil engineering, especially where it intersects with olden and ancient places. I encircled the Altstadt of Wiesbaden, around the Rathaus and Stadtschloss that houses the state parliament. Give Maptime a try and show us what you create as an icon of your city.

digital first

In a move similar to the investor malfeasance behind the ultimate demise of Sears and many high street anchor stores—rather than the narrative we’ve been sold about the pivot to online retail, an aggressive real estate operation is behind at least some of the rampant dissolution of the press and local media outlets.
The predatory firm is picking off already distressed newsrooms and redeveloping their property footprint—scaling back staff and encouraging tele-work (wrecking cohesion) in order to free up office space, either converted and sold on or retrofitted as a co-working venue. The title (not the same as the management group) refers to the idea in communication theory that breaking news should be channelled through new media (social platforms that direct to a web presence) rather than traditional formats—for the sake of expediency, though polish and rigour are often sacrificed in the process to have a scoop.

vanitas vanitatum, et omnia vanitas

Lush and indulgent, via Things Magazine, we are introduced to the portfolio and gallery showings of artist Andy Dixon, whose paintings are not only homages to classical conceits on the subject of impermanence but are also quite regularly commissions of the houses and tastes of patrons, teasing out the inflection point between wealth and art, as a store of the former and as a ostentatious and conspicuous display of the former.

achievement unlocked

In a move that makes the Olympics seem a little more relevant and meaningful—rather than an expensive showcase whose benefits are very, very fleeting for the venue—the always brilliant Nag on the Lake informs that for the 2020 Tokyo Games, in order to make a bold statement about sustainability and what we toss away with our mounting trash heaps of electronic waste, athlete’s medals will be sourced essentially fully from recovered precious metal. The symbolic recycling reflects Japan’s growing more conscience of the impact that such rampant consumption has for the planet and will hopeful influence more not just to prospect but to reduce buying what’s disposable and apt to be superannuated in the first place.

olfaction

Reading this account of how one person’s loss of her sense of smell, partial recovery and dealing with dysosmia—though far from suffering in complete solitude (27ᵗʰ February is Anosmia Awareness Day sponsored by the UK charity The Fifth Sense, which advocates for people with smell and taste disorders), left her a sort of shut-in (now rehabilitated) and made us appreciate our noses and taste buds and the even the crudest, simplest bouquet for all its worth.
Not only does a deficit in smell affect diet, routine and hygiene—as well as potentially posing a safety risk bereft of certain warning signals—it also steals away associative, sentimental memories. The author’s determination wrestle back that blessing through training and exercise, despite the rather bleak prognosis, is admirable and we’ll by searching later for our old vials of essential oils—lemon, eucalyptus, rosewater and clove, we knew they would be useful again one of these days—and starting on a vigorous regiment.