Favorites from Kattullus
Subscribe:
Displaying post 251 to 300 of 6218
a drink is quietly mixed by Mixie & a snack is quietly munched by Munchy
Mixie and Munchie are 2girls1bottl3 on TikTok.
The premise: Munchie has a snack while Mixie makes an elaborate boozy drink, which is then shared. Without a word of dialogue. In fact there is no monetization, no names, nothing more. Often the pair are wearing the fast food uniform, or glam, or not, and while the setting is usually just a booth at a fast food joint, the location is often completely different countries.
After a viral tweet Nicolaia Rips attempts to get to the bottom of it all in The Face.
US Chess President lashes out at victims and their allies
Earlier this year we talked about the Me Too Movement hitting the world of Chess. Here is a depressing update.
They figured out a thing!
She wrote to a scientist about her fatigue. It inspired a breakthrough: Her dogged efforts lead to a new scientific discovery that may help others with long covid and other chronically fatiguing illnesses (For those who aren't reading things that include animal research, this contains animal research) (Archive.org, abstract)
I'd say, 'How's it going?' And he'd say, 'Fine--fine.'
Douglas [Adams] enjoyed being a famous writer, but he loathed the process of becoming one. That entailed writing. He just hated doing it. It was hard work and lonely. He was a man who coped badly on his own; he needed company. Without it, he could fall into a kind of listless vacancy. from The Berkeley Hotel hostage [The Bookseller; ungated]
I can’t even hope to be nothing
In translating Pessoa’s heteronyms, one thing we see clearly is the influence of reading on Pessoa’s plural and inquiring mind. I have no doubt that reading more than writing was his primary and long-lasting literary occupation. His marginalia are of great interest; so are his many influences. This is to say that the more we know about what Pessoa read and when, the better equipped we are as translators of his works—especially to see more clearly his poetical diction, meters, and rhythms at the core of each heteronymic voice. from Fernando Pessoa’s Unselving [The Paris Review; ungated]
Heisse Preise
"In Austria, inflation is way above the EU average. There's no end in sight. This is especially true for basic needs like energy and food. Our government stated in May that they'd build a food price database together with the big grocery chains. But...."
Reminder: Everyday acts of civil disobedience are always an option.
Here's a couple examples. The present: A young woman walks down a street in Tehran, her hair uncovered, her jeans ripped, a bit of midriff exposed to the hot Iranian sun. An unmarried couple walk hand in hand. A woman holds her head high when asked by Iran's once-feared morality police to put a hijab on, and tells them: "Screw you!"
Newton's First Law Redux
You will recall it as "“Every body perseveres in its state of rest, or of uniform motion in a right line, unless it is compelled to change that state by forces impress’d thereon.” Or words to that effect.
Newton, however, wrote in Latin, and his first translator either took a liberty with or had his own views of a critical word.
She Invented Being an Influencer- and was Vilified for it.
Looking back at Julia Allison
(SL Rolling Stone- Exerpt from Taylor Lorenz's forthcoming book Extremely Online)
"You brought democracy to Chile"
Today marks the 50th anniversary of the September 11, 1973 Chilean coup that ended the democratically elected government of Salvador Allende, and inaugurated the 17-year dictatorship of Augusto Pinochet. Pablo Larraín's newest film, El Conde, satirizes the life of Pinochet as a 250-year old vampire and swindler suffering an existential crisis, receiving both accolades and critique. More below the fold for a history and docu-binge before the film is release on Netflix September 15th.
قهوة and cacahuaatl
From the Duolingo Blog: Are any words the same in all languages?
These are anxious questions
The most illuminating way to analyze the function of criticism is, first, to situate its authority, or lack thereof, within the politics of the state; second, to relate it to the institutions of cultural production and distribution; third, to orient it to the intellectual practices by which the genre is produced; and fourth, to credit it as the product of the critic’s idiosyncratic mind. To narrate the authority of criticism in all its richness and variety requires starting from the inside of this arrangement, from the critic’s mind, and working our way outward, to the contexts in which criticism circulates. from The Function of Criticism at the Present Time, by Merve Emre
Ængus, The Prize-Winning Hog, Emerged From a cranberry bog...
The prog rock band The Toxhards recently rose to fame after a video of them performing at wedding went viral.
Spaces Built For A Different Kind Of Person
“Like Modernism itself, it came from Europe, and it changed everything. You might not have heard of the Frankfurt Kitchen, but if you have neatly organized cabinets, an easy-to-clean tiled backsplash, and a colorful countertop, in a sense, you already cook in one.” How The Frankfurt Kitchen, designed by architect Margarete Schütte-Lihotzky, Changed How We Cook—and Live (City Lab)
Second coming
A neglected workers’ housing project by Alvar Aalto is being lovingly revived by design-minded Finns.
New residents, who include museum directors and high-ranking public servants, have been restoring the interiors to their original state and giving façades gentle nips and tucks.
She's the tall blonde one.
Cindy Wilson, one of The B-52s, has released her second solo album. Early single, Delirious, is a new wave synth soundscape, while Wait plays with sampled vocals, and Midnight is Eighties pop deliciousness. Yahoo Music has a lengthy write-up of the album and the artist, and you can find it all at Bandcamp.
Only Murders in the Building: Ghost Light
All roads lead the trio back to the Goosebury Theater during a nerve-rattling thunderstorm; with Howard as their jittery guide, they track a legendary ghost who's haunted the theatre for generations.
On this day in 1977, Voyager 1 launched.
Space.com looks back on the historic launch
Voyager 1 became the first spacecraft to reach interstellar space in 2012. The spacecraft’s next big encounter will take place in about 40,000 years, when it will fly by another star system.
I hope that someone gets my
72 years ago in Iowa, a worker named Mary Foss wrote a message onto an egg. She put the egg into a carton and sent the carton out for distribution. Last month, someone responded.
Global BIPOC Board Meeting #18 Minutes
Mefi Global BIPOC Advisory Board
Meeting 18 Minutes–Public
Jul 25, 2023
7AM PST - 9:00 AM (PST) 120 mins.
Roll call: Loup, Aielen, Cendawanita, Porpoise, Hurdy Gurdy Girl, MiraK (for part of meeting)
The Man of the Circular Ruins
An engaging overview of the unusual life of mathematician Alexander Grothendieck, by Luca Signorelli.
Strike meetings had to be translated into 25 different languages
Bread and Roses Strike of 1912.
In 1911, to ease (?) the harsh working conditions, the Massachusetts State Legislature cut the work week to 54 from 56 hours, effective Jan. 1, 1912. On January 11, Polish weavers at the Everett Mill (in Lawrence MA) got their first paychecks since the law took effect. Their pay had been cut by 32 cents, enough to buy three loaves of bread. As many as 25,000 walked off the job to the cry, ‘Short pay, all out!’ Most were women between the age of 14 and 18, and nearly half had been in the country for less than five years.
42 Students, Three Days, One Survivor, No Rules.
Battle Royale, revisited [The Verge]
“Before The Hunger Games, Fortnite, or Squid Game, the concept of the “battle royale” came from a pulpy 1999 Japanese novel by Koushun Takami. The movie, directed by Kinji Fukasaku and released just a year later, slims down some of the book’s context (scrubbed is the alternate history of Japan winning World War II), but the setup is more or less the same: a class of 15-year-old students are randomly selected to be made an example of. They are dropped on a remote island, given some weapons, and forced to kill each other off until a single person remains — the victor. Kids murdering each other? How cruel! But that’s the point. The violence of the battle royale is supposed to scare the authoritarian regime’s citizens into productive submission. As the students die, the movie counts down the remaining ones, like sport. Battle Royale is mean, and it’s not subtle.” [YouTube][Trailer]
The Quest to Pick Up the Lost Lifting Stones of Ireland
For centuries, Ireland’s stones were more than just a feature of the rugged landscape: The ability to pick them up off of the ground had deep practical and spiritual meaning. Lifting stones were used in tests of manhood (and, in a few cases, womanhood), hoisted at funerals to honor the dead, carried at weddings in celebration of the couple, and used to determine whether a man was strong enough to earn work as a farmhand. But in the 18th and 19th centuries, during British colonization, the practice largely vanished. Most of the stones remained untouched where they were last lifted. (archive.today link)
BLAST!
"Henri Gaudier-Brzeska, who was associated with the Vorticist movement in London, certainly died youngest. He was killed at 23, and, except for a few surviving sketches, and several small pieces of sculpture made while he was in the trenches (now lost), the period of his full artistic production actually ended when he left for the Front, in September of 1914, when he was still 22."
Henri Gaudier-Brzeska: The Process of Discovery.
F@$K you and the Stool you came in on
“A restaurant is a lot of work… I’m not gonna give someone my satisfaction of judging all my work and the hundreds of hours my partner and I put in with one bite. It’s not fair. I was like, fuck that guy.” - Dragon Pizza owner Charlie Redd speaks to Rolling stone about his feud with Barstool Sports CEO and Tucker Carlson guest Dave Portnoy.
alternate endings to hamlet | jennifer peepas
alternate endings to hamlet
by Jennifer Peepas (aka Captain Awkward). A quick but worthwhile read (there's also a 10 min. audio version) that ends with a killer reimagining of Hamlet. Content warning: threats of sexual violence.
Worst First Date
Let's feast! (single link to reddit video post)
Keep it rockin', doin' the same thing / And we get high on the breakdown
Apparently the "infectious" choreography for Jungle's "Back on 74" has been going viral on TikTok, with everyone from the international touring cast of West Side Story to Emily Ratajkowski getting in on the trend, but I learned about it from this LA Times interview with Shay Latukolan, the choreographer, who has previously lent his talents to videos for Rosalía's "SAOKO" and Stormzy's "Vossi Bop".
"I just published a wildly over-researched article--
--about a question that has been plaguing me for months: Why is this bridge here?"
The deepest of deep dives into the history of a seemingly trivial phenomenon: a footbridge over a suburban freeway south of Minneapolis. At the same time, an amazing piece of citizen research and reporting on a bit of pre-internet local history. (via)
"[T]he transformation of the internet into this shitty mall."
Ryan Broderick on The Verge writes on the possible end of the Googleverse. Mentioned: Usenet, Altavista, All Your Base Are Belong To Us, Myspace, AI, the sameness of recipe sites, Blogger, Google Reader, Perez Hilton and Anil Dash. Not mentioned: Google Plus.
Dr. Glaucomflecken
Dr. Glaucomflecken
has been a busy doctor comedian since his last appearance on the blue. His specialty is satirical videos about doctors and health insurance. That are a bit too on the nose.
Chandrayaan-3 has landed; India has made it to the moon
The Indian Space Research Organization's Chandrayaan-3 Vikram lander has successfully touched down near the moon's south pole. This video of the ISRO control center during Vikram's descent and soft landing from earlier today is tense and joyous.
a joy, a triumph, a delight, a madness
Oh! How the family affections combat
Within this heart; and each hour flings a bomb at
My burning soul; neither from owl nor from bat
Can peace be gained, until I clasp my wombat!
Angus Trumble writes for the Public Domain Review about the mid-19th century wombat craze.
Within this heart; and each hour flings a bomb at
My burning soul; neither from owl nor from bat
Can peace be gained, until I clasp my wombat!
Angus Trumble writes for the Public Domain Review about the mid-19th century wombat craze.
“O Uommibatto”
How the Pre-Raphaelites Became Obsessed with the Wombat.
Angus Trumble at the Public Domain Review on 'Dante Gabriel Rossetti and company's curious but longstanding fixation with the furry oddity that is the wombat — that "most beautiful of God's creatures" which found its way into their poems, their art, and even, for a brief while, their homes.'
Only Murders in the Building: The White Room
Charles' stage fright reaches unimaginable heights, involving a break from reality and multiple baby dolls. Mabel is confronted by a mysterious individual from her past with a pivotal proposal.
Only Murders in the Building: Grab Your Hankies
Oliver races to bring new life to his show as Mabel's investigation into the actual murder collides with a surprising ally. Charles bonds with the cast and Loretta proves her voice is invaluable.
Only Murders in the Building: The Beat Goes On
Mabel, Oliver, and Charles attend Ben's lavish memorial full of fans and those with more dubious motives.
Only Murders in the Building: The Show Must...
After Ben Glenroy's collapse on stage, Charles, Oliver, and Mabel piece together the show's first days with a suspicious cast and crew to determine if foul play was involved.
Consequences of the Tigray War
"Saudi border guards have killed at least hundreds of Ethiopian migrants and asylum seekers who tried to cross the Yemen-Saudi border between March 2022 and June 2023. Human Rights Watch research indicates that, at time of writing, the killings are continuing. Saudi border guards have used explosive weapons and shot people at close range, including women and children, in a pattern that is widespread and systematic." Saudi Arabian Mass Killings of Ethiopian Migrants at the Yemen-Saudi Border (HRW report) (One of the many consequences of the Tigray War where it's "estimated 162,000–600,000 people were killed" between 2020 and 2022)
One of the First Parts I Remember Noticing was the Section on Mermaids
Printed books from this period cover a huge range of topics and dozens of languages, but for me at least, they have one thing in common: I almost always find them far more interesting — more beautifully designed, more strange, more intriguing — than modern books. The rest of this post is a few thoughts on why. from Why Early Modern Books Are So Beautiful by Benjamin Breen
Special Event: 2023 FIFA Women's World Cup: The Final!
736 players, 163 goals, 63 games, 32 teams, 2 host countries, and it'll all come down to 1 champion.
1948, 1971 ... 2024?
There's no sign that the WGA and SAG-AFTRA strikes will let up anytime soon, as Hollywood creatives ratchet up the rhetoric by calling for the breakup of the studios on antitrust grounds.
As Matt Stoller reports, this makes strange bedfellows: "Most of the public noise during this period of chaos is coming from the more labor oriented activist-types, but behind the scenes, the serious financiers and producers are worried as well, because the ability to actually make money by making and distributing films and TV shows is falling apart."