A Touch of Politics

Just a tiny one.  Plus religion!  Two subjects you are not supposed to discuss at the dinner table for the price of one.  In 1885 a Republican from Ft. Dodge, one state Senator Jonathan Dolliver, declared:  "When Iowa goes Democratic, hell will go Methodist".  I'm not sure how he defined 'go Democratic', but I do wonder if hell went Calvinistic?  Fun Dolliver fact: he was considered a candidate to run for the Vice-Presidency in 1900 but bowed out when he heard Teddy Roosevelt was willing to take the nomination.  Either way an impressive mustache would have been featured in the campaign.

Source:  Des Moines Register, 7/25/1998 p 1M
Amazing Iowa / Janice Beck Stock

Dawning of the Age of Confusion

Did your astrological sign change?  Yeah, whose didn't, those were pretty significant shifts. And there's a new one - Ophiuchus!   So exciting!  I even know how to pronounce it because years ago I read the Ophiuchi Hotline by John Varley.  Great concept - suppose aliens didn't think humans were the smartest/best/coolest species on the planet?  Maybe because we believe in astrology.  Oh, it's pronounced o-FEE-oo-kus.  So I always thought my sign fit me pretty well.  I'm ready to look up the new one, let's see what the traits of a ... not even close.  Below find a link to a TIME site that will tell you if you have a new sign, then you can use our books to discover what it all means.  And when nothing matches up, ask yourself:  has the cosmos gone mad?????
TIME Newsfeed
Our Astrology Books

Just Guess What This Is

This, my friends, is one Coendou prehensilis or Prehensile-tailed Porcupine.  The coendu was photographed walking along a branch in 1928 on the Barro Colorado Island in Panama, minding its own business.  Given the extreme level of unattractiveness and the naked tail I would have guessed it for a relative of the opossum.   But coendus roll into a ball when threatened and they are nocturnal like our prettier but scary porcupines.  So I will have to concede the porcupine essence of the creature.  By the way "Little is known about courtship and mating interactions between the sexes."  I'm OK with that.  And who says 'opossum' anyway? 

Source:  University of Michigan Museum of Zoology
The Field Museum

Snow What?

This looks familiar, right?  Someone drew a snowman in the snow and took a black and white picture. Nope.  It is an impact crater on Mars!  But are they sure?  Remember the whole Face-on-Mars thing?  This could totally be a message from a highly advanced race of snowpeople.  Or it could be what the caption describes: "Scientists ... have discovered a crater that appears to have formed on Mars in the past 20 or so Earth years, and have used it and several other similar craters to estimate the present cratering rate on Mars." I'm all for figuring out the cratering rate. I mean, we have to know!  But the alien snowman theory is way cooler.

NASA Planetary Photo Journal Collection
Image Credit: NASA/JPL/MSSS

BIG STARS, small movies

These movies are small now anyway.  Entertaining, good plots, but not the first movie you think of when these names come up.  The stars are mighty 'o big though! 

The Gift   Cate Blanchett, Keanu Reeves  Finally the perfect use for Reeves' blank eyes.  He's terrifying as a bad guy.

Taking Lives   Angelina Jolie. Nice and twisty, and she isn't as scared as the DVD cover would have you believe.  C'mon, it's AJ!

The Game   Michael Douglas plays a powerful man (oh, the stretching!) but the game - or is it a game??? - may pull him down.

Fun films for staying indoors.  Which we may be doing.

Mayhem You May have Missed

These are thrillers from the silver screen that weren't your huge hits.  No blocks were busted.  No boffo to be had.  But they are very good. 

Frailty    Bill Paxton.  A father took his sons out demon-hunting.  But were the targets demons or just plain folks?  The effect on the brothers is devastating.


The forgotten    Julian Moore.  How could everyone forget she had a child?  But all evidence of her son is gone!  Imagination?  Or something more sinister...


The reckoning   Willem Dafoe and Paul Bettany. Ooooooh.  This is the coolest movie ever. In Medieval England a troupe of actors, including a runaway priest, pull a Hamlet before there was a Hamlet.  They solve a local murder and put on a play depicting the act.  Not exactly Judy and Mickey in a barn.  I should re-watch this.

Enjoy these strange, intense B-list movies! 

Gum Wall

Prague has its John Lennon Wall, but San Luis Obispo CA really classes it up.  Yes, the world-celebrated Wall 'O Gum can be found there.  And yes, I mean chewing gum.  And yes, it was chewed before its meticulous application to the wall.  Sound appealing?  The photo of the wall in "Ripley's believe it or not! Seeing is believing" didn't gag me, it mostly looks like lumps of saltwater taffy.  The inset however... people actually TASTE this chewed gum.  With their actual tongues! That inset is a photo of a licking.  The wall is in Bubblegum Alley and became a chewed chewing gum depository in the 1950's.  Imagine sampling a bit of gum first chomped in the year you were born.  No wait!  Don't! Imagine butterflies instead.

Ripley's believe it or not! Seeing is believing

Talk Like an Egyptian

Well not exactly but I couldn't resist the title.  It's Generator Day!  And you lucky things get to see how your name would look spelled out in hieroglyphs.  The author of the generator freely admits to fudging a bit, apparently some letters aren't represented by hieroglyphs.   So I wouldn't take my result to Ancient Civ because we're just having a laugh!  (I know, too much Ricky Gervais.)  The above is what happens when you type in 'Mary'.  We've got owl, vulture, the oval represents a mouth and the 2 green things are reeds.  So I'm thinking Mary means 'birds eat reeds'. Or not. Go get yourself a hieroglyphic handle!  It'll look good on your nameplate.
Ancient Egyptian Hieroglyphic Alphabet Translator

Antique Toys

Toys. They aren't guaranteed to make you happy - case in point, the young lady in the photo.  If you run across the term 'mint' when checking toy values it means "unplayed with, brand new, flawless'.  Is that not sad?  Some little guy had a toy that was to be looked at and don't touch that!  According to the 2010 edition of Schroeder's Collectible Toys, if the toy in the picture is a 'Horse on 4-Wheeled Platform' and she hadn't touched it the horse could be worth $350,000 today.  But she wouldn't be around to enjoy the money anyway.  So play away!
 
The caption of this photo was:  "Portrait of well dressed small girl with pull-along horse".  I'm guessing  Suri would find this little frock pathetic.  But it's clean!

Books for Toy Collectors
Graphic Source:  Powerhouse Museum Collection