CHRISTMAS ILLUSTRATIONS

One of my favorite illustrators is the Swiss artist Eugene Grasset (1845-1917). He produced a number of works for Harper's Magazine's Christmas issues. 

 

And one from his calendar series:

KOLACHE!

 All vegan Slovak treat! I tried a different vegan cream cheese, which tend to have an odd tone. To hedge my bets, I added grated orange rind to the dough. The result is very tasty-the orange interacting well with the almond paste logs. Damn good with coffee! And rich-not a low fat treat although the fat is plant-based. Chester looks on approvingly which, bless his heart, is his nature.

ILLUSTRATION BY PAWEL KUCZYNSKI

 

"Wall"

FIVE SECOND STORIES

 

Interesting ad for a feature on iPhone: Personal Voice samples and recreates your voice, so if you ever lose the ability to speak, you can continue to communicate through your iPhone, iPad, or Mac and still sound like you — which means your voice is never lost.

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German baking show translation: the dough has become like a cloud. Yep, soft and fluffy!

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The man had developed an intense yen for Triscuits-normally not one of his favorites. Perhaps his body was screaming for some fiber. 

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Gingerbread men! I haven't attempted making these (if ever) in 40 years! C had expressed a particular yen for these guys so I took on the baking. She was quite touched that I had taken the time to make them and we are both pleased with the results. We're both happy with my reducing the sugar by a third and in fact, I could probably cut the amount by half. Seems to bring out the flavor of the spices rather than have your taster overwhelmed with the sweetness. Chester looks on approvingly as well.  

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I bought a pair of these a month ago and I am very happy with them-warm and I like the sole grippers. I am not happy, however, either out of coincidence or because I bought them, with the fact that I am followed everywhere with Bombas ads. Alright already-I bought your product, now leave me the eff alone! 

Imagined corporate reply: 

Dear valued customer-thank you for your purchase of Bombas. We're sorry you are unhappy with our continued outreach but if you read the terms and conditions of your purchase, you will see that by virtue of your actions, you have granted our algorithms permission to afford you the opportunity to make additional purchases. Have a happy holiday! Bombas

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The owner of a family-owned business, seeing his empire of 15 stores spiraling into debt, became erratic when it came to solutions for his problems. In one scheme, he decided that all heating and a/c in the stores would now be controlled remotely, by him. I can save a few bucks and I use this to punish stores when they underperform. Roasting their balls or freezing their fingers ought to get their attention he thought.

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From an Attenborough doc: for some, there is a wait for the water temperature to reach 16° C. Once achieved, for many species on the reef, it is time to mate!

Another example of how temperature impacts species, whether it is temperature signalling the time to mate or determining what gender a turtle will be while it is still in its egg or when to head in a certain direction in the ocean to coincide with the arrival of a species that will feed you so you can procreate and have food for the little ones. 

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Bad subtitling classic: anemone was translated as anonymity. There was a bit of logic to this-some fish species was hiding in the anonymity.

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Wood turning with epoxy resin to create wood bowls, vases. Cool patterns, but one has to wonder about the toxicity of resin dust.

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We splurged and bought a Frazier fir from Tannenbaum Tree farm on 12/8. Wow! What a tree! Biggest one we have ever gotten. Nicest weather as well with temps in the lo-50's and not too muddy. 

 

We had our traditional tree-trimming party-I made vegan chex mix in the morning and yes, there exists a vegan W sauce. It's from Whole Foods, part of their 365 organic line. Not as sharp as regular W sauce, which is of little surprise without the anchovies. Still, it's a decent sub and does the job. Word of warning-take time to fully whisk the W sauce into the melted butter otherwise it won't emulsify and you'll have stretches of chex with butter but no W sauce. 

 

We brought Mr. Big Tree home, got him into the stand and set him up in the library. Buddy quietly watched from the Great Room. What the heck are Mom and Dad doing now? I got the fire going and C put on YT her favorite version of The Nutcracker ballet-1977 with Baryshnikov-for background music and viewing. We cracked open some adult beverages-C was drinking her non-alcoholic cabernet, I dipped into some Grand Marnier. When we finished and were hanging out on the couch, Bud surveyed the scene with little interest and joined us for some scritches.

What a magnificent tree!

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C bought Buddy a couple of catnip delivery devices for stocking stuffers. Our old one from Aunt Karen was retired-battered from years of use. She thought these were a hoot.

Mr. Chameleon

Mr. Pineapple

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Saturday, 12/9 was even warmer, reaching 59 in the early afternoon. Bud napped in a corner of sunshine on my bed.

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A fascinating doc from the National Art Gallery about the Dutch artist Johannes Vermeer (1632-1675). Arty and academic, this piece reminded me of Art History classes I took back in the day. Vermeer has always been one of my favorite artists with his astonishing skill of depicting light. What I didn't know and what I found so interesting was the in-depth examination of his work. He was a big time user of perspective and his inventive brushwork is astonishingly prescient of the Impressionists 200 years later. Well worth one's time to simply admire the efforts of this great artist.

FIVE SECOND STORIES

 

Something that we appreciate about this big guy is his politeness. For example, C asked some pals over during the Turkey Day weekend to do some holiday crafting. She had put out a zillion things-pencils, paints, brushes, paper, old magazines for collages all on a long table. It's been up for a week and we have noticed that not once did Buddy jump up on the table and start flicking items off with his Lordship's paws. We're so lucky! Other cats would have been there raising havoc the day of the event. Thank you, Bud!

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USDA Plant Hardiness Zone Map For MI 2023

In the first update since 1990 (!). Lansing, which used to be 5b is now 6a, indicative of climate warming.

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The cat who authored two scientific papers:

Google Scholar

 

From the Los Alamos National Laboratory:

In 1975, F.D.C. Willard co-authored a paper about atomic behavior, "Two-,Three-,and Four-Atom Exhange Effects in bcc3 He". The Physical Review of Letters published the paper. Willard, a Siamese cat, shared the writing credit with human Jack H. Hetherington, a physicist and mathematician at Michigan State University. The paper was prodigious accomplishment, as F.D.C. Willard was only seven years old at the time of publication.

Some secrecy surrounded the collaboration between the two researchers. F.D.C. Willard was actually a nom de plume. His true name was simply Chester. The more formal attribution stood for “Felis Domesticus Chester,” and Willard was the name of the cat’s father. Hetherington later claimed that he had been the sole author of the paper, and that he attributed credit to his cat, Chester, as a way to minimize edits to the original manuscript. According to Hetherington, he had mistakenly used the plural “we” instead of the singular “I” throughout the document, which he had laboriously typed on a typewriter. Not wanting to retype the paper, he took a shortcut by adding F.D.C. Willard as co-author.

However, some doubt exists about the supposed lack of F.D.C. Willard’s contribution to the publication, as he was later the sole author of a paper about solid helium 3 in the French journal Recherche. While he was clearly fluent in French, perhaps the four-legged physicist’s demonstrated reluctance to speak to the press on his own behalf accounts for the widespread support of Hetherington’s narrative.

While speculation remains, it is worth noting that no animosity existed between the two researchers, and they remained lifelong companions, with Hetherington frequently referencing F.D.C. Willard in footnotes of subsequent publications.

F.D.C. Willard (Chester) passed away in 1982, a notable contributor to the field of atomic research. He was a good boy.

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The mural at Shanora's Wigs

Robert Killips

Originally painted in 1993 by Mark Beard, this was one of the oldest surviving murals in the Lansing area. Depicted above is a second version painted in 2008. Sadly, Shanora's has closed and the mural painted over with brown paint. One wonders why the new owners of the property did this? If it was a question of repair, they could have called for crowdfunding. Hell, people do it to finance Grandma's funeral or help buy their child a new kidney. They could easily replace the sign with whatever new business comes in but retain the mural to honor this landmark that has been part of the community for 30 years as a tribute to the contributions of Black folk in American society. What a shame.

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A new Mtn. Dew ad with the tagline: Your soul needs a refresh. Mtn. Dew can help.

Three Gen Xers college pals got the degree but are stuck in boring, unfulfilling jobs which are not even close to their dreams. But, they got rent, gotta eat and have a boatload of education debt. You gotta do what you gotta do.

One day, they begin to collectively hallucinate and with the help of their friend Dew, they transform into a hybrid of their old selves! And for these new selves, it's a brand new day! Their inner souls, refreshed, stand on the edge of greatness. Create your own tribe and anything is possible. Your soul needs DEW! Hallelujah! Can I get an amen??!! 

Oi! Let's catch our breath and step back in wonder of the power of caffeine and sugar. This densely packaged visual piece has a gumbo of references: gaming, Transformers, the new crew is so hip that when they walk into a bar and they receive a chin up greeting from an established cool bro. There are a couple of curious references for Boomers: a quick recreation of the Beatles Abbey Road album cover; and a point back to the TV series The Mod Squad which had the tagline: one black, one white, one blonde. Yeah, that was a cool crew and the updated version replaces Linc with a Hispanic. They break the rules, dress wildly, drive strange vehicles, paint murals. Are they getting paid for anything? 

Ahh, it was all a dream. But the caffeine and sugar experience has awakened something deep inside them (gee, can we get any more Jesusy than this?) and moving forward, they realize that they can be more than what they had. The piece ends with metaphor: our three heroes, standing together in a under construction high rise (small caption: do not attempt), with the beams of a new day warming their faces. It is done.

There was definitely some time, thought and effort in creating this 2 minute piece and I can appreciate that. But stepping back, all in the service of selling a soft drink? Sigh, I guess if you are in the biz, you might as well create something interesting, evocative vs some generic schlock.

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Parker's Mood-1948-Charlie Parker alto sax. John Lewis piano, Curly Russell bass, Max Roach drums.

It is said that Parker was so good on alto sax that veterans and newcomers switched to tenor or bass sax in order to keep working.

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Every other day or so comes a welcomed event at our house: a fresh can morning/evening! A new, room temperature can of food is opened for our Buddy. He is very appreciative- vocalizing, twining and tailing. We haven't gotten to the point yet where we are nuking his chilled food yet.

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Josh Cellars, a Californian wine with the tagline: Bring more to every moment. Sure it does, when you have a good buzz on! And their reserve wines are made for life's most cherished moments. Your feet hit the floor in the morning-have a glass! Breakfast of champions! You get the trash out on the correct day-have a glass! By this metric, you're smashed by noon.

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 From Mad Magazine 2016. Now known as the MAGA pledge.

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THE SIMPSONS

We're big fans of the Simp's and one of the reasons is their astonishing creativity and often quick referencing in surreal circumstances. Blink, and you miss them. A couple of recent examples from Season 28-in episode 10, Dutch artist Theo Jansen and his kinetic sculptures Strandbeest turn up at Springfield's Winter Fair.

Episode 9 begins with Bob Fosse doing his signature walk on a high wire amongst the clouds and closes with the couch gag that quickly turns into a recreation of Francisco Goya's famous 3rd of May, 1808 painting supporting Spanish resistance to Napoleon's armies.

This is half the pleasure of watching: catching and identifying these clever bits. I think few if any group of writers has as much creative freedom in the industry.
 

SEEN WHILE OUT AND ABOUT

I was driving home via the street just north of the house. It has a curve with a number of crab apple trees planted along side the street, just up from the Farm Bureau solar array. C had mentioned seeing a number of hen turkey by the trees the other day and today both Toms and hens were hanging out although in separate groups. What was extraordinary was that 3 of the hens were in the trees having a snack! I slowed to view this rare sight and they all got nervous and ran into the adjoining woods where the creek flows. Now, crab apples aren't the heartiest trees and the main branches aren't that big. But here, strong enough to hold a hen. 

Bon appetit!

Sage

I managed to find a pic online. Yay!
 

FIVE SECOND STORIES

A modern update of the "you'll love our stuff/prices" advertising:

Home Depot sez it is making it easier to buy stuff from their site with your Iphone when you swipe right. Yep, fall in LUV with your new frig! Gawd, Tinder association with Black Friday. 

Do the appliances keep track? Do they get depressed when folks swipe left? Nobody wants me! wails an unsold microwave in a agony aunt feature in the Times Modern Love section. Did they want black instead of stainless steel? Is 1000 watts of power too much, making me seem overly aggressive?

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Meanwhile, both my credit card and debit card have been hacked in a matter of days of each other. I received a fraud alert from the CU and went in yesterday to get new card (rather than wait for it to be mailed) but no dice. Evidently, the printing software was having a bad Monday and was glitchy. Going back this am. Watch out! My finger points at Amazon.

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Thanksgiving feast! Puff pastry galettes with caramelized onions and a menagerie of mushrooms sauteed with rosemary; ramekins with dressing baked crispy, roasted asparagus. Served with mushroom gravy. Dessert: for C-vegan chocolate cupcake from Sweet Encounters downtown Lansing served with almond milk vanilla and caramel ice cream, I had a slice of carrot cake (Kroger was out of the single serve pumpkin pie with topping). For Buddy, it was a fresh can evening-Friskies Whitefish and Sardine shreds at room temperature-one of his favs. Yummers!

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11/24 Mostly sunny and cold: 23° this morning. Sharp North breeze. 

Li'l Woody hard at work, I could hear him tapping as I brought in firewood.

Buddy basking in the sun away from the wind.

 11/25: 16° Turkeys out and about

 11/27 and 11/28 Snow and cold

Big Woody hard at work

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Meet Hermagoras sigillatus, a stick insect found in tropical forests such as those found in Borneo.

 

Here they are out of their environment. Extraordinary camo!

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When I lived in OK for a bit, I found work via a temp service at a factory that assembled and packaged fishing rods. It was in a town a half hour drive away and I worked a 4pm-midnight shift. My co-workers were a diverse group: a pair of ladies from Columbia, several Cherokee women, a New Orleans lesbian chef who was a refugee from Hurricane Katrina, a variety of black, white and hispanic folk. The job was simple-one person broke open a folded box, taped the bottom, put in the requisite number of rods into it then sent the box down a conveyor to the next person who stuffed paper on top and taped the box shut and placed on a pallet. My partner was an old hand and team leader, a young guy whose nickname was "Gadget" because he had an Walkman. He had a limited amount of tunes available and this one we heard every night, several times:

This is Evanscence, an odd convergence of goth and soprano.

Our supervisor was a small black woman who always wore a do-rag with the demeanor of a drill sergeant. She was no-nonsense and had everyone on a short-leash. Hitting nightly production quotas was her main goal-we were packaging the rods to be shipped nationwide to stores before fishing season arrived. When I arrived for my first shift, her comment to me was that I was too well-dressed with a oxford style shirt. The next day I wore a long-sleeved t-shirt. One shift there was a big problem that she brought to our attention. She had done some QC on random boxes and had found that they were missing some rods. She was hollering! She was going to halt production, have us go through every box from several pallets already done and make sure all were correctly packaged. This seemed insane to me so I stepped up and made a suggestion. The mere action pissed her off even more-her eyes lit up as she stared at me. "Why not take the weight of a correct box, then simply weigh all of them?" was my idea. "This saves time since you don't have to re-tape everything and therefore less time spent away from production". Her eyes narrowed-she had me pegged as a college-boy anyway from the shirt incident and now this. "Sure" she said "since it's your idea, you get to do the job" with a bit of a smirk, as if this was some weird punishment. "No problem" and I set off to do the job. She got production going as I found an empty pallet, put a scale on a table and began breaking down a stacked pallet. Having spent years in grocery stocking, this was familiar stuff to me. Under her watchful eyes, I went through all the pallets from that night's production. In the end, I had found 4-5 boxes that were short. It didn't take that long and I returned to my station and the grins of my co-workers. I did earn a grunt of appreciation from the Super who from then on had a softened attitude towards me. I had earned her respect.

ANALEMMA

The blurb from the vid: Time-lapse of the Sun in the West, one picture every 24 hours: the solar analemma. Watch as the Sun traces out a figure 8 in the sky each year. Why does the position of the Sun change day-to-day? The Earth spins about its axis at about a 23.5 degree angle to its orbital axis around the Sun, and the Earth orbits the Sun in an ellipse, moving faster when closer to the Sun. The result is that the position of the Sun in the sky changes not just minute by minute as the Earth rotates, but day to day as well as the Earth moves through its orbit. The figure 8 path traced out by the Sun when viewed in 24 hour increments is known as the solar analemma.

MO' MOVIES: AFTER LIFE

 

From 1998, a film by Hirokazu Kore-eda, known as "Wonderful Life" in Japan. From the Criterion site:

If you could choose only one memory to hold on to for eternity, what would it be? That’s the question at the heart of Hirokazu Kore-eda’s revelatory international breakthrough, a bittersweet fantasia in which the recently deceased find themselves in a limbo realm where they must select a single cherished moment from their life to be recreated on film for them to take into the next world. After Life’s high-concept premise is grounded in Kore‑eda’s documentary-like approach to the material, which he shaped through interviews with hundreds of Japanese citizens. What emerges is a panoramic vision of the human experience—its ephemeral joys and lingering regrets—and a quietly profound meditation on memory, our interconnectedness, and the amberlike power of cinema to freeze time.

Oh, and so much more. A commentary on Japanese culture,  with its bureaucracy and rules, rules, rules. Having watched the American TV series "The Good Place", which has a similar theme, it was interesting to compare the two societies-their beliefs and values. There's a good whiff of Fellini in this film as well especially in its satire. One subplot not discussed in the blurb and integral to the story are the folks working in the afterlife, who interview and figure out how to put the newly dead's favorite memories on film. Where do they come from? Why are they there?

Intriguing concept, beautifully realized and thought provoking. Please don't be put off by the subject matter-it is not morbid at all.

 

Available from The Criterion Collection.

 

THANKSGIVING-THE STALWART DANDELION

Mr. Grumpy Oak finally gave up 99% of his leaves over the past couple of days. My neighbor has been out there everyday mowing the leaves. Today was partly sunny, temps in mid-40's with a light wind. With snow showers rumored to arrive Sunday, I thought I'd better get out there and finished up the leaves for the season. About mid-day, I came across this guy:

There's been enough rain and warmth to mimic March so he gave it a go, his head craned towards the waning late November sun. Not sure if he'll make it to seed but I bet he will go dormant and I'll see him again in the early Spring.
 

THE KENNEDY ASSASSINATION-60 YEARS AGO TODAY

 

Corbis

 

On this day, I was in the 4th grade. The first news flash of the shooting had gone out and we were told by our teacher. It was after lunch and classes were on hold as the school administrators  decided what to do. Meanwhile, with a class full of antsy nine year olds, our teacher gave us permission to go outside if we wish. Despite it being wet, chilly and overcast, me and a couple of guys went out and shot some baskets. I clearly remember Chuck, who was a bit of a wag, remarking that it must have been a relative of John Wilkes Booth who had shot the president. We were all in disbelief-who would want to hurt JFK? 

We were soon summoned back to the building and told that we were being sent home. Back in those days, such announcements went public via the radio. Mom often had the radio on so when I got in, she had made me a grilled cheese and a glass of milk and we went into the living room. It was a large space with picture windows on the North and South sides. She had all the drapes closed so we could see the B/W TV better, as it was on the South end. She was grim. So was Dad when he got home and together, we watched Walter Cronkite recap the awful news about what happened in Dallas.

 

FIVE SECOND STORIES

 It's gotten chilly-in the low 20's:

Still, the sun is strong:

 

My next door neighbor is out mowing nearly everyday possible to keep up with the huge droppage of leaves (see above). I am lazy and just will try and tackle it before the snow comes...or just not worry about it. For him, it gives him something to do.

You can see where he mows.

Oaks can be difficult for they are late droppers. Now, I have not known many oaks but at least this one is quite obnoxious. Like one of those drunken louts in a pub who is only tolerated because he is 6'8". "Ha, ha, ha" he yells everytime you are out, "I got more for you M............s!

Patterns

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Hoosegow-slang for jail The word comes from the Mexican Spanish word “juzgado,” meaning “tribunal” or “judge. The ending was corrupted to "gao".

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I just learned that the Britspeak word "spare" means "to be very angry or upset". This adds a layer to Prince Harry's memoir "Spare" which Yanks would presume meant his status in the line of succession. His brother William is the heir, Harry is the "spare". Evidently, Harry is pissed about it all. 

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Gaza and the Israelis: this is a very, very, very old feud and it is astonishing to see it rear it's ugly head in 2023 as a continuation from several millennia ago. I'm not knowledgeable about their holy books but I would bet there are warnings about this kind of savage tribal bloodletting. But it seems few are listening to these warnings and worse, each side thinks they have the blessing from their version of a supernatural being! WTF.

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Common Lionfish, pterois miles, the Moe Szyslak of the coral reefs.

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Deborah Byrd

For the past few weeks, we have been treated with both a morning star, Venus and an evening star, Jupiter.

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A watergirl who becomes one with the sea, helped by a flying spirit guide. Artist unknown. 

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https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wyXTiDTlfW4&t=323s 

Stumbled upon while surfing YT: fabulous time-lapse shorts of plants growing from seed. My fav is the sunflower.

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C bought me the Mad Magazine Stocking Stuffer and this was a feature from a bad gift catalog. Reindeer Orgy! This puerile sense of humor from Mad always appealed to me and I would rightfully say is one of the foundation stones of what I find funny.

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Meet Mr. Red-breasted Nuthatch! I saw this little guy in the willow next to my office today. I had no idea he lived here! 

PS He's been hanging out- flitting around. I noticed his shape even with the shade closed. I wondered why he was here and it came to me: crabapples! I bent over and craned my neck to see the tree. Yep, he's been feasting all day at the Krabappel Kafe!

 

Modern fable: Simpson's Edna Krabappel dies and  reincarnates as a crabapple tree. It's one of god's jokes, the kind he is gently scolded about by the administrative angels. Stranger still, the tree contains much of Edna's consciousness. So, the teacher reads up on crabapple trees (please don't ask me how) and decides that since she creates this fruit and it is an important food source for many, she will be the very best she can be as a crabapple. So it goes. She opens the Krabappel Kafe and remains open for 40 years. Edna had never felt such a rewarding life. That was her gift-she was a nurturer. 

 

The administrative angels thought this would be a perfect way for the almighty to make up for his bad joke: Moving forward, each reincarnation will speak to her strength. It's such efficient use for this resource purred the actuaries. None of these half-wits bumbling around, doing a half-ass job, never learning a damn thing from one life to the next. 

 

Now, this is unfair. You created this glitch and you continue to be shocked, shocked I tell you sir, when we only use the cards we have been dealt. Use your powers, wave your hand. 

Upgrade us.

Oh well, small victories. It's always a rare find to run into folk where work gives them joy and have managed that tricky jujitsu in life, pursuing successfully that what makes them happy and so much more and get paid for it. Teaching, I have found, is such an environment. C, her band of fellow travelers and all the Ednas, good on you.

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MO' MOVIES: "THE SNOWMAN"

 

"The Snowman" is a 26 minute animated film made in 1982 based on the Raymond Briggs 1978 picture book of the same name. There are no words so everything is communicated through gestures and facial expressions-which is well done here. Very inventive style of animation with some fabulous scenes (I won't spoil your surprise). The plot is simple: after a night of heavy snow, a boy gleefully gets up and rushes outside and builds a snowman. That night, the boy finds that the snowman has come to life. They become buddies and spend a night of adventure!

A charming film for all ages-we both were astonished that somehow in the past 41 years, this never hit our radar. It should be a holiday classic right alongside "A Charlie Brown Christmas".