If I were in Philadelphia next week, I'd be at the Mütter Museum on Tuesday, where to celebrate the macabre holiday they are showing Tod Browning's Freaks. One of the most disturbing museums in the world and one of the most disturbing movies of all time…how can you pass up a combination like that?
(via Museum Madness)
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You're also going to miss the Dracula Parade at the Rosenbach tomorrow night:
http://www.rosenbach.org/programs/rtb/rtb05.html#parade
If you do find yourself in Philly, PZ, you're free to crash on my sofa.
QUOTE OF THE DAY
"I don't care if I vote for Happy the Clown, just so it's not who's there now," said Mary Nyilas, 51, an independent voter from Cologne, N.J. She said she would do everything she could to "vote against the powers that put us in this situation" in Iraq.
My former housemate from Austin was visiting Philly a few months ago and I took him to Mutter. Indeed a unique experience.
My internal struggle right now is deciding whether or not to take some visitors I will have from Japan there next month after Thanksgiving. Since they're only in Philly for 2 days, there are a lot of things one could do and as cool as the Mutter Museum is, I am not sure how high it is on the list of things to show foreign visitors who are only there for a day. Sure, start with Independence Hall and the Liberty Bell, and they'll be staying near Reading Terminal Market, but what's the best thing after that? The Franklin Institute (which BTW has the Darwin exhibit thru Dec 31)?
this is frontpaged on yahoo.com right now:
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20061026/ap_on_sc/vampire_science
if only they'd apply critical thinking to the holy ghost!
The DVD for Freaks was released in I think the last couple of years. Great print, and a lot of cool extras. Put it in your netflix queue.
Also get The Forbidden Zone for a cross-generational double bill.
Off topic. Professoy Myers, there is this "most emailed scicence blogs story" that is about Dawkins and the God Delusion. It was a critical story, but quite frankly, way over my head. I have no clue what it said. Do you think you can give us an idea what they are saying, particularly for those of us not trained in quantum physics?
"One of us! One of us! Gooble gobble, gooble gobble!"
Synopsis ( read: spoiler site) of "Freaks" available at:
http://www.olgabaclanova.com/freaks_script_synopsis.htm
PZ: "We accept you! We accept you! Gooble gobble! Gooble gobble!"
Bet you never expected a theist to say THAT....:)
What a cool looking museum. It's like the Royal College of Surgeons collection here in Edinburgh. My Mum spent her Saturdays there as a child helping her aunt who was a curator. She says there's a wheen of stuff there that the public never sees. Two-headed and two-bodied conjoined foetuses etc.
I'm so jealous! I have always wanted to go to the Mutter Museum.
Gooble Gobble! Gooble! Gobble! We will make you one of us! - Freaks rocks.
Oh, you're NOT going. That's too bad. What a great way to celebrate Halloween, though.
The Count and I are going to Salem, Mass., as we do every year. Witch City, here we come!
I went to a showing of Freaks at Rutgers over 30 years ago, during the days when hippies were often referred to as "freaks." Many of the students who went, figured this was a movie about hippies. Boy, were they in for a surprise!
Some years back, the Baltimore Evening Sun had an article about a fellow that painted screens (painted window screens was a folk art in B'more). Turns out, this painter was one of the stars of Freaks, they guy with no arms and no legs (but managed to light his cigarettes).
As they pulled you out of the oxygen tent
You asked for the latest party
With your silicone hump and your ten inch stump
Dressed like a priest you was
Tod Brownings freak you was
Wow, know I know what David Bowie was talking about. Sort of.
Turns out, this painter was one of the stars of Freaks, they guy with no arms and no legs (but managed to light his cigarettes).
That would be Prince Randian. Apparently, he was also a carpenter and spoke several languages.
And look over here! Johnny Eck (aka "the half-boy"; aka "Nature's Greatest Mistake") has his own website!
I've been looking for some Halloween web-browsing to do. Now I'll track down the web presence of the cast of Freaks.