9x9 (12. 559)

the coffer illusion: studies in cross-cultural perception have insights behind their controversy—see previously  

rolling stock: new homeowner shocked to find a hidden model train alcove in the basement and has a new, unexpected restoration project—via Nag on the Lake  

reading the minutes: AI note-takers outnumber human participants in virtual meeting spaces  

remastered: British Film Institute hosts a rare screening of the original 1977 Star Wars on Technicolour reels  

no undo button for our fallen democracy: a chorus of responses to the cathedral-, not-in-our-lifetimes thinking that has replaced American exceptionalism  

hello stranger: a signature work of scrolly-telling from The Pudding of people who don’t know each other holding conversations—via Quantum of Sollazzo 

they’re all good boys: the golden retriever, Gilbert, assassinated along with the state congress representative and her husband lay in state at the Minnesota capitol 

heaven and earth magic: a 1962 cutout animation short by avant-garde filmmaker Harry Everett Smith made in residence at the Chelsea Hotel  

static spin: a superlative optical illusion

synchronoptica

one year ago: returning via Switzerland (with synchronopticæ) plus a new Labour government for the UK

twelve years ago: the US Mail-Cover Programme,  Stars Wars as written by Shakespeare plus America policing the world

thirteen years ago: a geography challenge 

obbba (12. 558)

To provide reconciliation pursuant to title II of the House of Congressional Representatives Resolution Fourteen, according to its long title, Trump signed his signature One Big Beautiful Bill into law after being passed by the narrowest of margins in the legislature amid fanfare and a celebratory lap as atrocities continue in Palestine and Ukraine following supposed US-brokered peace deals, with a flyover by a formation of the B-2s that took part in inconclusive bombing runs in Operation Midnight Hammer that attacked Iran’s nuclear enrichment facilities. Chiefly a vehicle to permanently extend the tax rates Trump introduced in 2017 for the wealthiest individuals set to expire, the domestic policy legislation contains hundreds of other provisions that drew ire from the public and politicians alike, reductions to popular social programmes and increasing the deficit significantly—ostensibly causing the very public and messy rift between Elon Musk and Trump, with the former backer threatening to primary the Republicans who eventually voted for it and hinting he might disclose how he helped rig the latter’s re-election. Several fiscally conservative members of the GOP held out until the last minute of the self-imposed Independence Day deadline, settling to defer most of the major cuts to medicaid and medicare and social security benefits until the next congress—targeted to offset some of the costs of the loss of tax revenue, shifting the onus and granting some purchase to undo them if Democrats prevail in the midterms. The regressive tax regime represents an upward transfer of wealth from the poorest to the richest, papered over with gimmicks like no taxes on tips and overtime or reintroducing chattel slavery by hinting that farmers could retain undocumented workers under their judgement, a fee on remittances from guest workers to family aboard and a surcharge to apply for asylum to balance a weaponised immigration enforcement agency to placate plantation owners concerns about deportations and losing cheap agricultural labour. The law further restricts food assistance programmes for the poor, health promotion and outreach, caps tuition aid for higher education, eviscerates consumer protection activities and limits recourse and permanently repeals the de minimis entry privileges that formerly allowed low-value shipments to be imported tariff-free.

31/atlas (12. 557)

Spotted only a few days ago by astronomers in Chile at an associate observatory under the auspices of the international Asteroid-Terrestrial impact Last Alert System monitoring station that’s the future home of the Vera Rubin observatory, the Large Synoptic Survey Telescope which will be capable of scanning the entire sky of the Southern Hemisphere every few days as the largest digital camera ever constructed and watching for changes—including such interstellar interlopers—the inbound comet originating from another solar system is only the third such object passing through to have been verified. Like the explosion in the discovery of gravitational wave phenomena, more visitors like ʻOumuamua and Borisov are bound to be found, advanced imaging techniques underwritten by more data but now both enterprises are in jeopardy by funding cuts to NASA, sponsor to both. And while anyone can determine whether a trajectory is parabolic or hyperbolic or predict a collision course, a potential loss of telemetry seems of great gravity when it comes to such global studies and preservation for Earth and other knock on effects. Significantly brighter than the previous two encounters and traceable by amateur astronomers, the comet, posing no threat to Earth, won’t be visible at perihelion as it will be on the other side of the Sun then in October but at its closest approach to Mars, it may be detected by Martian rovers and satellites.

synchronoptica

one year ago:  the introduction of the Caesar salad (with synchronopticæ) plus the waterfalls of Mount Cuvignone

twelve years ago: a trip along the Rhein plus a revolution in Egypt

thirteen years ago: the God particle plus national drinks

fourteen years ago: the passing of Otto von Hapsburg and the legacy of the Austro-Hungarian Empire 

jargeau (12. 556)

On the way back from Morbihan in south Brittany, we crossed back into the central Loire valley and found a nice campsite on l’île aux Moulins in the river between the later partitioned towns of Jargeau and St Denis de l’Hôtel, just outside of Orléans. This intermediate stop brought us back coincidentally to another connection with Joan of Arc.

It was here during the Hundred Years’ War, after receiving her field promotion, she had her first military success, delivering the town from English occupation on 12 June 1429–on battle’s anniversary in 1920, Joan was beatified and declared a national heroine. Following the Edict of Nantes to seek some accommodation for Protestantism, the town was split with the original community of Jargeau listed as a safe haven for Huguenots.

Symbolically as a statement against religious tolerance and to practically divide Republicans from Royalists, the ancient stone bridge linking the two communities was destroyed during the French Revolution and anti-clerical terror. The medieval foundations are still present as stepping stones but the new span was not completed until 1998. During Nazi occupation, the town was host to a concentration camp for political prisoners, specifically a KZ-Lager for Nomaden—that is, Roma and Sinti people rounded up. The area to the east of town, Le Clos Ferbois, made a memorial to the resistance and some seventeen thousand individuals who were incarcerated there.

synchronoptica

one year ago: the ancient quarter of Maccagno (with synchronopticæ)

thirteen years ago: musical performance rights in Germany, paternalism and the EU plus ad revenue

fourteen years ago: a cursed economy 

unblogged breizh (12. 565)

Some miscellany: Lots of streets here are named in honour of a Doctor Laennec. This esteemed individual from Quimper, René-Théophile-Hyacinthe, drawing on his skill with crafting wooden flutes as a hobby and a medical background, invented the stethoscope and defined many aspects of respiratory ailments, as well as introducing the technique of intubation and coining clinical terms like cirrhosis and melanoma.

While Germany has its preference for traffic circles as well, France really has perfected the rond-point or carrefour giratoire (treiñ-tro) at every crossroad (great and small), which really reduces the logistics of a left turn and the need for extra lanes and on- / off-ramps but can become a bit exhausting, particularly when every one is announced by the navigation.

Though the traditional protectress of Brittany is Mary’s mother Anne—with a basilica dedicated in her honour at Auray (after an apparition) and multiple patrons are no longer recognised, whose cult is first attested, the figure not developed as an ancestor of Jesus in the wider Church in Europe until long after established as mamm gozh ar Vretoned, grandmother of the Bretons.

The fête was finally made official by Pope Pius X on her feast day, 26 July, in 1914. The jubilee year marks the date when pilgrimages her shrine were authorised for the first time.

 

synchronoptica

one year ago: Lago Delio (with synchronopticæ) 

twelve years ago: a visit to Frankonian Switzerland 

sixteen years ago: IKEA napkin designs 

gwened (12. 564)

Capital of the Moribihan department of the Bretagne region, we made a visit to the ancient harbour and Old Town quarter of Vannes, whose ducal seat goes back to the Gallo-Roman settlement of Darioritum (then named for the seafaring Veneti people whose land was occupied, the Breton version derived from the same) and was considered the chief city and parliamentary centre of independent Brittany from the fifth century, with the first king Nominoë reigning in the early 1000s until the time of the French Revolution.

The entire medieval townscape was quite a sight to take in and we had quite a few impressions of the well-preserved, walled core and ensemble of historic buildings.

The heraldic charge of the city is the ermine, also reflected in the flag of Brittany, which we really like as the dog’s coat is similarly scored with a white spot on her chest with the same noble marking.

Another famous emblem of the patrimony of the city is a polychrome architectural element, Vannes et sa Femme, a stone bust of the couple dating from the sixteenth century incorporated into a half-timbered building’s façade (maison à colombage, presently a pizzeria) and the jovial pair possibly originally advertised a cabaret. This pixelated image affixed to a wall just outside Place Henry-IV is perhaps an homage to Missus Vannes.

littoral (12. 563)

The commune encompassing several small villages and hamlets and islands including Île de Saint Cado and the Étel riviera, the administrative anchor town of Belz, which despite having grown as a tourist destination has retained its character as a small village only expanding off one central main street (see also) with the townhall intact with original bell tower.

The toponym is thought to have come from the Breton form of the name of the Celtic god Belenos, a serpent with the head of ram—uncoincidentally our hermit above is said to have driven out the snakes from the islands, coinciding with the destruction of many megaliths, though the prehistoric iconoclasm was not universal and most were only cannibalised for ready building material.

The community observed the eightieth anniversary of the Normandy landings and Allied flags of the UK, Canada and the US are still hanging above the streets with more information at the memorial of Belz and its involvement in the wars of the twentieth century.

synchronoptica

one year ago: the castles of Bellinzona (with synchronopticæ) plus the US supreme court grants presidents blanket immunity for official acts

ten years ago: America calling for an end to hostilities in Ukraine plus mediation and mantras 

fourteen years ago: Germany ends mandatory military service 

sixteen years ago: synthetic trees for carbon capture 

habitués à pêcher (12. 562)

Returning to the Quiberon peninsula, we drove all the way to the southern tip to explore—as much as the oppressive heat would admit—the eponymous fishing village, stopping to marvel at more sites along the rugged coast explored to the Atlantic, unlike the protected eastern shores sheltered by the gulf.

We visited the old harbour of Port-Haliguen, which like all fishing villages in the area benefited greatly from the commerce and catch up through the Belle Époque—particularly Quiberon which had become the world’s first cannery after Nicolas Appert of Châlons-en-Champagne introduced his airtight food preservation process, applying corking techniques and sanitization on an industrial scale and establishing a tinning operation.

The sardine crisis first emerged during the 1902-1903 season and while most communities were able to adapt with deep sea fishing for tuna and mackerel, this unfortunate timing meant that the invention of Appert was no commercial success and the process of food perseveration was gifted to the public. Quiberon maintains canning operations and the port is a marina for leisure and departures for outlying islands.

synchronoptica

one year ago: the Holy Mountain of Varese (with synchronopticæ)

twelve years ago: a visit to Linsengericht plus snooping on NATO partners

fourteen years ago: more on the Greek financial crisis

fifteen years ago: the lowly mosquito