Frivolity

Glove map of London, 1851, by George Shove. Printed map on leather. (via Mapping the Marvellous) Long before Googlemaps on an iPhone or handheld GPS devices, there was this very analog Victorian Glove Map! (I already posted this wonderful glove on the old bioephemera, but was inspired by a recent conversation with my boss to revisit it.) During the AAAS meeting last month, Stanford's Barbara Tversky showed an illustration of a technique used by Native Americans to remember maps, in which the outline of the hand symbolized the local coastline. I tried to dig up the original reference, but…
Zooillogix posted this video of an elephant that paints "realistic paintings of other elephants:" It's a fluff piece, granted, but it gestures towards credibility by bringing in an "art expert" (and, I'm guessing, cutting 98% of her comments). The genial narrator, anticipating our astonishment that an elephant could learn to paint portraits, reassures us that it is indeed possible, and that "what makes it possible is the trunk." Uh, no. The trunk is what makes it possible for the elephant to grasp a human-style brush and execute fine motor movements. The brain is what makes any artist an…
When Garfield is digitally erased from his eponymous comic strip, Jon's life is somehow elevated to a minimalist tale of pathos, surrealism and irony - as this new blog proves: I think buying a monkey is a cure for boredom that most people don't explore seriously enough. Especially if it's a flying monkey. Via Blog of a Bookslut
"Fetus Egg"The Museum of Food Anomalies If you've ever seen Darwin's face on a piece of toast, or a midsaggital brain section in a Michelangelo, you'll love MoFA, a repository of culinary pareidolia.
Klingle Ford Bridge Wreck, 1925 National Photo Company Collection Courtesy of Shorpy: proof that even in 1925, traffic on Connecticut Avenue was hell. This wreck occurred about a mile or so from my apartment, near the National Zoo. As a work of art, it's uninspiring. But somehow its placement within my personal territory gives it a certain poignant fascination, a sort of urban archaeological authority. John Updike recently wrote a book review for the New Yorker on "the art of snapshots," in which he said, My own shoeboxes of curling, yellowing snapshots derive their fascination almost…
Homeland Security Kitchen Towel Christy Rupp Labels for Genetically Altered Food Christy Rupp Artist Christy Rupp has created a small line of products designed to freak people out, in the hope that alarm will translate into environmental awareness. Let's hope she's right. At the very least, they're pretty cool hostess gifts for fellow enviro-geeks. Shown here: Homeland Security Towel, $65, "A remedy for that queasy feeling at home," and Labels for Genetically Altered Food, $30, "Celebrate the mystery while you speculate what that new breed of organisms in your digestive system is up to!"
Ok, this story is not my typical blog topic, but it's from my very own hometown - and so effectively illustrates why I don't live there anymore. Back in December, our local paper coincidentally ran the following two photos on its front page. The top photo depicts a local sign painter doing his artistic holiday thing, and getting a plug for his eponymous small business. Smart marketing, right? But immediately below, we have a security photo of the suspect in the theft of a wallet at a gas station about a mile away: Let's see. . . where have we seen that man before. . . hmmmmmmmmm. . . take…
I finally got around to visiting freerice.com, a vocabulary game that lets you "win" donations of rice for needy countries. (Yes, it's like the SAT, but some of us find that kind of thing fun.) The words start off easy, but ramp up to a pleasing level of difficulty; I played for about ten minutes and hovered around a score of 50, peaking at 52. How does it work? Advertisers pay per click, and the rice is purchased (mostly in Pakistan and Japan) and distributed by the United Nations' World Food Program. This story describes how the program is helping refugees in Bangladesh; 20 grains of rice…