synchronoptica
one year ago: Bilbo Baggins’ birthday (with synchronopticรฆ), St Mauritius, first contact plus a presidential assassination attempt (1975)
twelve years ago: Singapore’s Super Trees, bad real estate photographs plus untamed houseplants
thirteen years ago: promoting women executives
On this day in 2004, Green Day released their seventh studio album—their first in four years—American Idiot, an overtly political and socially critical record, the tracks, especially the title one, expresses the disillusionment and decent of a generation whose prospects were informed by 9/11 and the resulting forever wars. 
A telling of the gospel of Jesus of Suburbia, a precarious working-class anti-hero figure, the suite of songs were put together as a concept album for a punk rock opera, taking inspiration from Jesus Christ Superstar, The Rocky Horror Picture Show and The Rise and Fall of Ziggy Stardust and the Spiders from Mars. Charting worldwide, it was also against the media apparatus, which in the band’s view had crossed from journalism to sensationalism and reality TV, glorified violence of combat in Iraq intercut with advertisements. An enduring protest song, lyrics have been subtly updated from redneck to “I’m not a part of the [MAGA/ELON] agenda” and “subliminal mind-Trump America.” Wake me up when September ends.
the dominator model continues to run the world: Lydia Lunch’s timeless feminist manifesto
jut: a new way to measure the magnitude and magnificence of mountains—via Metafilter
and i’m floating in the most peculiar way: a cover of Major Tom by Magdalena Bay—via Nag on the Lake’s Sunday Links
bequest: an assortment of old customs and curious donations and charities
red noise: the French musical underground’s decade of synths and situationists—via { feuilleton }
๐พ: writing lessons in Cuneiform
being of sound minds and body: collection of captivating wills and last testaments—via Strange Company
you’ve really made the grade: a scroll through the archives of David Bowie
pathfinder: a look into the inner-workings of Google Maps
me and bobbie mckee: the forgotten inspiration for the gender-swapping ballad of Kris Kristofferson and Janis Joplin—see previously
synchronoptica
one year ago: Weird Al parodies Bob Dylan with palindromes (with synchronopticรฆ) plus more gerrymandering
twelve years ago: a possible clue to hidden Nazi loot hidden on sheet music
fourteen years ago: the Pope comes home to Germany
fifteen years ago: GMO salmon
Interested in the ways brains process visual information and the influence of context and frame of reference, psychologist Jules Beuchet first described his eponymous chair illusion in the mid twentieth century, and while popular for museum installations and retaining the effect in photographs unlike some others (see also here and here), we learn that the compelling dissonance, accidentally exemplified by this image of the giant Bidens with the tiny Carters without set up—courtesy of Futility Closet—we discover a new, more portable technique for disabusing this trick, staged easier with a tripod, a miniature frame and piece of upholstery, requiring much less space and focal length to achieve the result.
Very much enjoying these tales of recycled props and sets (see previously here and here), we were thrilled that not only did the author get to see his namesake disaster flick on the big screen for the first time, that cinematic experience allowed him pinpoint the provenance of elements of the decor. 
The golden panels that clad the walls of the cruise ship’s mess were repurposed from Cleopatra, and feature Egyptians and hieroglyphics although the boat is named the SS Poseidon after the Greek sea god for a bit of mixed mythology. The skylight “ceiling” of the ballroom is also the backdrop of the Harmonia Gardens number featured in Hello Dolly!—both the Taylor and Streisand films being a huge expense for the studios, it made sense to do some double-dipping. Much more from Poseidon’s Underworld at the link above.
Whilst transcripts of the telephone call between Trump and President Xi of China emphasis progress on 
trade amid the American tariff war, curbing the supply of fentanyl and the divesture of TikTok in order to stop a ban on the popular social media platform, the released summaries failed to make any mention Taiwan, and given the timing of the reported decision for a pause in US aid and weapons sales to Taipei, it is feared that US dropping its support—a “temporary tactical concession”—for neighbouring Republic of China is being used as leverage for open markets and better positions Beijing to annex the break-away island which has long enjoyed American backing over symbolic promises like to quell the flow compounds that can be used to make drugs.
synchronoptica
one year ago: residential fire safety (with synchronopticรฆ), assorted links to revisit plus anti-social media
twelve years ago: the constellation of Nintendo games
thirteen years ago: smear campaigns, wine pairings plus the banner of the Sรกmi people
fourteen years ago: EU monetary policy
fifteen years ago: regulating speech on the internet
sixteen years ago: yearbook yourself
admissible evidence: AI translations of animal vocalisations in the court room and other assorted legal stupidity
mulholland drive: the Mid-Century Modern estate of David Lynch (previously) in the Hollywood Hill is up for sale
happy blogoversary: Damn Interesting turns twenty
รตhuruum: more incursions of Russian fighter jets into NATO airspace, this time over Estonia—see previously
⠝⠕⠍⠕⠎: overcoming wartime injuries that took both his sight and hands, a Greek youth taught himself to read Braille with his tongue and became a lawyer
ministry of public enlightenment and propaganda: from the wires, 4 February 1939
phlegmatic: the ancient origins of personality typing
yawaraka jazz: an individual in Japan expertly DJs their collection of vintage vinyls with no commercial interruptions—via Web Curios
feme covert, feme sole: Brigitte Macron, wife of the French president and whole human being in her own right, has agreed to provide scientific evidence to a US court to prove that she is biologically female from birth—via the New Shelton wet/dry
