(12. 891)

For its WotY, Dictionies.com has selected “6-7” from its list of contenders for terms capturing the Zeitgeist of language and culture over the past twelve months, not just about confusion, neologism or popularity but moreover as a socio-linguistic mirror to visage. In the shortlist of other reference authorities, the meme, phrase and accompanying hand gestures from from a nonsense lyric in a song by Philadelphia rapper Skrilla, titled “Doot Doot (Six-Seven).” And while grammarians have tried to apply several interpretations as to its meaning and etymology—from a reference to a street in the artist’s hometown or police code, which despite being incorrect have increased its rather enduring lore as opposed to recent marketing campaigns by fast food franchises and rumours that the next AI model will be called GPT-6-7 (surely a sign the trend is about to plummet)—it is genuinely a meaningless phrase though positive among cohorts who can share it together. The Wikipedia entry for the much older, fourteenth century English idiom to describe a situation in disarray—“at sixes and sevens”—from the proto-version of gambling dice game craps called hazard has not been updated to reflect this new phenomenon.

synchronoptica

one year ago: the events that inspired The Wicker Man (with synchronopticæ), an ancient amulet discovered, a thousand days of the war on Ukraine, shifting through default video titles plus Mister Plow (1992)

twelve years ago: digital footprints 

thirteen years ago: market bubbles 

fourteen years ago: in for a penny, in for a pound 

fifteen years ago: free-range exoplanets 

sixteen years ago: preppers and doubters 

discharge petition (12. 890)

Following the release of a tranche of incriminating emails and documents last week from the estate of disgraced financier and convicted pedophile Jeffrey Epstein and with Trump’s unexpected reversal (suspect and perhaps an attempt at normalising such abusive behaviour or over-confidence that all the right records were purged) on his stance that the growing movement was a hoax perpetrated by his Democratic opposition to discredit him and acquiescing to full disclosure, both chambers of the US legislature voted (we had some fear that the process would be pre-empted by a declaration of war)—with near unanimity, four hundred and twenty-seven to one congress members agreeing, even with the staunchest hold-outs, like house speaker Mike Johnson flipping and the senate fast-tracking the bill without a formal vote. The bill, the Epstein Files Transparency Act, will now go to the desk of the president to sign into law (something which Trump could have directed at any time without being compelled by congress), requiring the attorney general to disclose all records and investigative material not subject to classification, reserving the right to withhold information that might jeopardise on-going investigations or involuntarily out the identity of victims.

10x10 (12. 889)

trip hop: frustrated with his limited role in Massive Attack, Tricky embarked on his independent project Maxinquaye  

chud atlantis: more regional car-dealership rococo from McMansion Hell  

linguistic zombie hunting: a revival of the old prescriptivist superstition against ending a sentence with a preposition and the grammarians that support it 

state capture: the revolving door between government and industry creating the post-democratic world order—via Quantum of Sollazzo 

♾️ series: visual proofs that 1/4 + 1/16 + 1/64 + 1/256… yields ⅓  

circlesquare: filmmaker Jaron Albertin’s rather disturbing music video for “Seven Minutes” 

artful dodger: Victorian mugshots of juvenile offenders—via Nag on the Lake  

stay puft: some facts all about marshmallows sealab: project Tektite and experimenting with submerged human habitats  

giscardpunk: Fifth Republic techno-futurism reimagined—see previously 

synchronoptica

one year ago: farming by lottery (with synchronopticæ) plus assorted links to revisit

twelve years ago: coded correspondence

thirteen years ago: Thanksgiving salutations  

fourteen years ago: Bretton Woods and monetary unions 

fifteen years ago: privacy and Google Maps plus trade unions and Ricardian economics

parasocial (12. 888)

A term from academia coined by sociologists back in the mid-1950s observing how viewer formed very much unrequited bonds with television personalities—particularly soap opera characters but also news anchors and any regular guest hailing from TV land—the word chosen as Cambridge Dictionary’s Word of the Year (previously) remained a clinical one until recently, having in the past few years entered into popular parlance thanks to social media fandom. The paramour phenomena not just restricted to following, the confessional nature of podcasts and AI chat is also forging confidants in hosts and bots alike—see also. Driven by look ups alone with no judgment passed on the healthiness of such a one-sided connection, as surrogates for actual friends and family, learn more about the term’s provenance that pre-dates publication by centuries at the link up top.

kid icarus (12. 887)

Collaborating with astrophotographer Andrew McCarthy, skydiver and musician Gabriel C Brown captured this incredible image of Brown transiting the Sun with an appreciable measure of luck and timing to triangulate and signal the exact moment for the jump and the shot, a composite mosaic through a telescope’s lens of the Sun roiling surface remotely tracking Brown’s falling silhouette, captured in the course of six passes by the ultralight prop-plane in the skies over Arizona.

synchronoptica

one year ago: Musk as Salacious Crumb (with synchronopticæ), letters to the president, Julian time plus Trump pushes through controversial nominees

twelve years ago: outsourcing espionage plus moving Germany’s spy agency headquarters from Bonn   

thirteen years ago: a survey of customer service 

fourteen years ago: a news roundup 

fifteen years ago: hysteria and security theatre 

building & loan (12. 886)

Whilst calling “affordability” a hoax perpetrated by Democrats and blathering on about how much grocery, energy costs and inflation is down (a sentiment contrary to economic realities and one that the public is not buying), Trump seeming undermined his own argument with a multi-pronged approach to lowering consumer prices first by directing the justice department to investigate price gouging and collusion in the meat-packing industry that has made beef more expensive, reversing tariffs on some staple imports—plus a promise to issue individual stimulus cheques from duties dividends, through revenues won’t satisfy promised payouts, direct payments as opposed to extended subsidies for health insurance coverage premiums to encourage Americans to become entrepreneurs in their wellness and most controversially the introduction of a fifty-year mortgage to make homeownership achievable to more with nominally lower monthly outlays—though over a much long period, deferring outright tenancy and building equity, with more going towards interest rather than the principal.

noahs segel (12. 885)

Though we had been to the slopes of the Ellenbogen mountain before and visited the restaurant at the Thüringer Rhönhaus, we never made it to the summit before to see the viewing platform completed in 2017.  

On the way, however, the foggy and overcast weather did not seem so promising until the last couple of kilometres with climbing elevation the skies gloriously opened up. An extinct volcano, it is one of the highest points in the range and on a clear day, one is awarded with vistas of Bavaria, Hesse and Thüringen near the tri-point where the three states touch. On a clear day, from the observation tower—named Noah’s Sail for its information centre about the local flora and fauna and its profile—one can see the Brocken as well as the neighbouring peaks of the Wasserkuppe and the Milseburg. 

Though H didn’t want to join, I took that slide back down and had a nice sunny walk to the top across the massif before descending afterwards back into the fog bank of lower altitudes.

synchronoptica

one year ago: assorted links worth the revisit (with synchronopticæ), animated GIFs from Etienne Jacobs plus a survey of international traffic signs and license plates

thirteen years ago: carnival season 

fourteen years ago: modern geoglyphs plus Kissinger and Clinton 

fifteen years ago: security theatre plus adopt a word

sixteen years ago: a mythical member of the German parliament 

seventeen years ago: keeping it local 

et in aradia ego (12. 884)

Though the authenticity and authorship of the received gospel of the witches studied and published US folklorist and journalist Charles Godfrey Leland in 1899 is disputed by later historians and ethnographers, what Leland through his intermediary and research assistant Donna Roma Lister—a widely respected British writer on the occult and accomplished medium in her own right, believed to be genuine religious text of a Tuscan coven has played an unimpeachably large role in informing and influencing contemporary Wiccan and Neopagan movements. Syncretic and secret, the practise and spellcraft continued in parallel to the rituals of Roman Catholicism but hidden in plain sight as sort of a liberation doctrine to subvert and counter the oppression of the Church orthodoxy and social order.
The titular messianic figure, similar to the Italian form of the name Herodias—the wife of Herod Antipas whose real genealogy was buried in the belief of early Christianity, a characterisation of course propagated by witches themselves, that for her complicity in the death of John the Baptist her spirit was condemned to wander the Earth forever and only permitted to rest in treetops between midnight and daybreak, whereas Erodiade was a continuation of the ancient Roman cult of Diana and her nymphs, a daughter sired by prideful angel Lucifer and sent by the goddess to be a teacher unto women and men who would break from the yoke of enslavement—see also—and the real proto-witch. The gospel in fragmented form was completed by Lister’s interviews and channelling to fill in the gaps. Much more, particularly on our collaborator and ghost-writer, from Public Domain Review contributor A D Manns at the link up top.