October 31, 2018
Miffa Miffa Meeka Moo!
Homestar Runner Halloween 2018: Mr. Poofers Must Die, the story of a dog that no one can bring themselves to kill when telling a creepy ghost story. [more inside]
Actually evil, not high school evil
In the Ocean of Night
So let me spell it out for you... 1. A year ago, we got buzzed by a really weird interstellar object that is looking increasingly like some sort of galactic sentry buoy. [more inside]
A spectre is haunting the streets ....
Socialists Must Reclaim Halloween, China Miéville
"a celebration of the chaotic social over the orderly individual, an intuitive solidarity with those called monsters, and a principled refusal to be afraid of the dark." [more inside]
I heard there was a scary chord…
During the 19th century, composers like Franz Liszt and Richard Wagner cracked the code of creepiness. The sonic dread they pioneered involved two key ingredients that horror movies and metal bands still use today: a forbidden sequence of notes known as “Satan in music,” and a spooky little ditty that Gregorian monks sang about the apocalypse. ♫ Cue unsettling chord. ♫
Archaeology of the Night: life after dark in the ancient world
What the Archaeology of Night Reveals. Podcast. TEDx talk. Symposium abstracts. The Archaeology of Darkness: abstracts.
Art History Parades Around the Streets of Japan Ahead of Halloween
Well-thumbed books
Maybe English-readers will enjoy little books with the spine on top (slNYT). They're already successful in the Netherlands. Perhaps fiction will evolve away from the doorstops again?
"The Radical Restaurants of Father Divine, Founder of Peace Mission"
The case was brought to Justice Lewis J. Smith, who sentenced Divine to a year in prison. But four days after the sentencing, the 55-year-old judge died of a sudden heart attack. When journalists asked for Divine’s reaction, his brazen response made headlines, and helped turn the cult leader into a media phenomenon: "I hated to do it," he reportedly said.— Heaven Was a Place in Harlem by Vince Dixon, about "the radical tableside evangelism of Father Divine — equal parts holy man, charlatan, civil rights leader, and wildly successful restaurateur".
Hoity Toity Squiggles
Analysis: Lets get rid of the apostrophe. Opinion: Apostrophes are members of the English alphabet, not punctuation, and too important to lose. Previously.
What age are you most likely to become homeless in NYC? 1 year.
There is a picture of homelessness etched in public perception: a solitary, disheveled man holding a cardboard sign. But the largest single population in NYC's shelters is kids under 6. Antonio Sanchez lives with his parents and two older siblings in a studio-like apartment provided by a shelter organization. He was born into homelessness, and when he was just one week old, he was one of 11,234 children under 6 living in a shelter system that houses about 60,000 people daily. There were 1,164 children born into the shelter system last year, up from 877 in 2015, according to data obtained by the Coalition for the Homeless.
"I think it's hard for people to come to terms with their own mortality"
Timothy Caulfield is the Canada Research Chair in Health Law and Policy, Professor & Research Director at the University of Alberta. He is also fascinated by pseudoscientific celebrity health advice, specifically how it's based on bad science, and on that topic, published the book Is Gwyneth Paltrow Wrong About Everything? (Goodreads). He also uses his humour, quick wit and science knowledge to investigate trendy diets, ancient therapies, wellness and anti-aging products to separate science fact from fiction in a series called A User’s Guide to Cheating Death (YT, trailer). He's into his second season of six episodes each, streaming for free from Vision TV for folks in Canada, and all 12 episodes are available on Netflix, too. More below the break. [more inside]
La la la la la la la la la la (Halloween! Halloween!)
This is Halloween by Danny Elfman [YouTube] • This is Halloween by Panic at the Disco [YouTube] • This is Halloween by Marilyn Manson [YouTube] • This is Halloween by Broken Peach [YouTube] • This is Halloween (Violin Cover) [YouTube] • This is Halloween (Piano Cover) [YouTube] • This is Halloween (Music Box Cover) [YouTube] • This is Halloween (A Cappella) [YouTube] • This is Halloween (Spanish Cover) by Creepypastas [YouTube]
Neither Escape Nor Catharsis but Rather a Repetition of Trauma
On this spoopiest of days, let us indulge in the most Metafilter of indulgences and overthink our way through scary movies.
“After World War I, Horror Movies were Invaded by an Army of Reanimated Corpses” by W. Scott Poole
"The movies. . . are just entertainment and so they are simply mirror images of the culture that produced them, flexible and flaccid in the messages they convey. He did not think that this made them. . . possible instruments of revolutionary change. Instead, as artifacts of mass culture, they put dissent to sleep, enervated their audiences, and legitimized the existing order." [more inside]
Water tastes like nothing. Why would I drink nothing? What’s the point?
"I’d rather quench my thirst with castor oil than have to take a sip of water. I remember really not liking it from about six or seven and tended to drink a lot of milk as a kid. I’m now in my 30s, and it makes me feel sick to the stomach when I see people constantly 'hydrating' with big, huge bottles of mountain-fresh spring water (shudder)."
Meet the Hydro-Haters: The People Who Refuse to Drink Water, No Matter What [Quinn Myers, MEL Magazine]
Meet the Hydro-Haters: The People Who Refuse to Drink Water, No Matter What [Quinn Myers, MEL Magazine]
Call your girlfriend...and tell her to listen to Honey.
Don’t kiss your birds
The CDC has clarified that it never said you couldn't dress your chickens up for Halloween. It's unclear why news outlets reported that the CDC referenced Halloween specifically, but its website has a guide about handling poultry in general.
Hundreds of witches pick paddles over broomsticks
The event, called Standup Paddleboard Witch Paddle, dodged days of rain, catching a short window of sunshine for the entire three-hour event. [more inside]
Classically Trained Pianist Helps Soothe Elephants
"They say an elephant never forgets, and those at Elephants World in Thailand will certainly never forget Paul Barton. Barton is the man who introduced these elephants to classical music." "Barton is a classical pianist who has shared his talents with some very big audiences — literally big. He spends a lot of his time performing for elephants. Barton shares his experiences with these giant creatures in vlogs on his YouTube channel and on Facebook, and his videos have gone viral."
The Enduring Mystique of The Waterboys’ Fisherman’s Blues
Fisherman's Blues turns 30 "Sometimes you hear an album and there is no immediate way to make sense of it. There might be hints, small ways in which you can locate it in the ‘80s or ‘90s or ‘60s or whatever...But it still sounds like it occurred in a slightly altered version of that reality, emanated less from the world you know and recognize and more from an echo or reflection. ...These are the albums that exist out of time, not just removed from the trends of their era but seemingly the product of a visitor who isn’t even aware of that era, but is looking for something more eternal."
So, to start with, Unions are really important.
it seems that there's someone who wants to talk to you.
Toby Fox has announced a new project via the @UnderTale twitter account for Halloween. Spoilers abound, so beware... [more inside]
C'est l'Halloween, c'est l'halloween, HEY!
Martial Arts Novelist Jin Yong R.I.P.
Louis Cha (penname Jin Yong), famous for epic wuxia novels, has died. While few of his books have been translated into English, Cha is one of the world’s most-read Chinese authors, with fans across China, Hong Kong, Taiwan and throughout the Chinese diaspora. His stories have been adapted into television shows, films, comic books, and video games. The first part of his most popular series, Legends of the Condor Heroes, was published in English earlier this year.
1984+6
1990 was a 1970s television series depicting a then future UK under dystopian state control following an economic collapse. [more inside]
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