- Starting us off straight into things you shouldnât watch if someone else is peeking over your shoulder, weird-internet-history connoisseur Justin Whang brings us the stories of the men with knobs on their arms. [14â˛]
- Early English editions of Euclidâs Elements used pop-ups to illustrate 3D proofs.
-
T.i.l. about the
âquasiquoteâ, a
punctuation mark used in early fan zines to indicate
âparaphrased or inexact quotesâ. - Two nice stories to end the day:
Posts in EnglishPage 15
Construction work underway
Hi, all â just a little update to tell you fine folk that iâm doing some retheming around the blog, and, as such, sidenotes will be borked for a little while. Sorry for any inconvenience. (Donât see anything? Press Ctrl+F5, or â+Shift+R if youâre on a Mac.)
Lords of Misrule
This is a copy of the main page for this event.
âIĹ Saturnalia!â So went the cry that marked the start of the eponymous classical holiday. For one glorious week, Roman society was turned on its head: slaves became masters; togas were out and ostentatious displays of colour were in; gag gifts were given; and one lucky person was elected the local King of Saturnalia. Whatever orders the King barked had to be followed, no matter how ridiculous. This tradition clung on even into the Christian middle ages as the English âlord of misruleâ â a lone pagan vestige in a monotheistic world.
So, in the spirit of those winter holidays, to lighten up this frosty time of year, i thought it would be fun to let you play that rule for my website. Welcome, one and all, to the first annual satyrs.eu Lords of Misrule!
If you write or put together something â absolutely anything â and email it to misrule@satyrs.eu, come Saturnalia (thatâs December 17 to 23, for those who understandably arenât up to date with ancient festival customs) iâll put it up on the site, both on the blog and on its own dedicated, permanent subpage, etched in stone for all to see.
I would ask that you donât submit any political polemics (weâve had quite enough of those) or anything that would get me in legal trouble, but apart from that, anything goes. Your granâs chocolate cake recipe? An impassioned defence of Freddy Got Fingered as an ironic masterpiece? A rant about how keyboards arenât what they used to be? Whatever you â my lords of misrule â want.
You can submit your entries from today until the 16th of December, 2021. Have fun, and donât be afraid to get weird with it!
â Marijn
Two-word horror story: Aeroplane surstrĂśmming.
The mystery of Newcastleâs vampire rabbit
Down a narrow alleyway to the back end of St Nicholasâ Cathedral, in Newcastle, one can find a rather curious decoration garnishing a door on the opposing façade. The âvampire rabbitâ has stood watch over the cathedral for at least half a century; while records are scarce (a quick search of Google Books doesnât bring up anything until the twenty-first century), it could well date back to the buildingâs construction in 1901.
Hereâs the thing, though. Nobody knows how it got there. Indeed, even the name âvampire rabbitâ is a misnomer; its jet-black fur and red claws were added on some time in the 1990s,i as were its distinctly batty ears. Some say it was put there to scare away wannabe graverobbers, but i have my doubts that twentieth-century crooks would be so dumb.
Yet others posit that it represents a mad March hare, arising at the time of Easter, or that it refers to Thomas Bewick, a nearby engraver who had a fondness of all things lagomorphic. Most fascinatingly, a theory advanced by one Mr Adam Curtis suggests a Masonic pun in reference to one George Hare Phillipson, a local doctor (hence vampires) and active Freemason, as was the lead architect, one William H. Wood. It being a secret society in-joke would also explain why itâs located around the back, rather than the front, which faces onto one of the busiest streets in town.
Perhaps we might never know for sure. In any case, itâs a fascinating little secret â what do you think is most likely?
Other people's posts
âGood 4 Uâ played exclusively using big plastic sticks
I only listen to real music. Presented by a student society of drummers at Harvard:
(hat tip to, uh, the Youtube algorithm)
Nee heb je, ja kun je krijgen
We have a saying in the Netherlands: âNee heb je, ja kun je krijgen.â It translates to something like youâve already got a no; you might as well try for a yes â itâs always better to ask rather than stay silent.
Thereâs a few English phrases that are similar. Up north, shy bairns get nowt is a common instruction from parents; across the pond, hockey player Wayne Gretzky contributed the saying you miss 100% of the shots you donât take to the local lexicon in a 1991 interview.
Are there any similar sayings in your neck of the woods, or your language? Iâd love to hear.
Halloweâen
It was in the evening, just before the sun fell and dusk set in, that i packed my bags and went. A short jaunt to the cemetery, to see some old friends.
I never knew my great-uncle and -aunt, but their name still holds some worth; their middle name and surnames i was bestowed at birth. I searched fruitlessly through the old graves, filled with fallen war-time knaves, but finally, by a bench and basket of waste, i found the coupleâs resting place.
I didnât think it would affect me so much, but just at the sight i felt the touch of a salty trickle running down my cheeks. I knelt and felt i could weep for weeks. As evening turned to dusk and dusk turned to night, i jotted down the words inscribed in white:
We often think of bygone days when we were all together The family chain is broken now but memories live forever
Rest in peace, Tim and Annie. Happy Halloweâen.
Letter of recommendation: Censor
I recently had some downtime and, since âtis the season, watched Censor, a small British horror film about a film censor during the âvideo nastyâ panic who investigates a strangely familiar scene.
Itâs tense, stylish, and scary â all the more impressive coming from its first-time director, Prano Bailey-Bond â becoming more and more surreal the further it progresses. Give it a watch, why donât you?
Some nice local businesses at Ponteland market
The family and i went to a local food-and-craft market at Pontelandâs garden centre this morning. I thought iâd send letters of recommendation for some of the stalls.
Urban Bakery, from Gateshead, make the most decadent cinnamon buns iâve ever had.
The Alnwick Soap Company produce wonderful soaps inspired by the scents of rural Northumberland. I plumped for the ginger-and-grapefruit and cedarwood-and-juniper myself.
Mrs Bâs Kitchen, from Durham, sells jams, conserves, chutneys, honey, sauces â all the things you ever need in the top drawer of your fridge. (I got the rhubarb and raspberry.)
Hops and Dots, of Bishop Auckland, make âaccessible craft beerâ with Braille on the labels.
Wilde Farm, of Ponteland, are ostensibly running the whole thing, and sell... you know, farm things. Carrots, veg, burgers, sausages, turkey â you get the idea. Theyâre currently taking orders for the winter holidays.
White walls, grey sofas, potted plants
When i was just a bairn, my oma was an avid scrapbooker and collage-maker. Dotted around the walls, alongside the paintings, antique cupboards, and kitschy statues of dogs, were little collaged images of every important moment in her life â and mine.
Just by looking around her house, you could instantly get a sense of who she was, and what she cared about. (Her dogs. She cares a lot about her dogs.) It was disorganised, it was a wee bit cluttered â but it was hers.
Todayâs trends are rather different. Some time after the great recession (when it became, understandably, somewhat gauche to display how much Stuff you owned), the style du jour turned to blank, white walls, with spare tables and maybe (if you were lucky) the occasional potted plant. As this bareness took over, i canât help but feel something was lost.i
The top results for âminimalist living roomâ on Google Images, for example, tell you almost nothing at all about the person who might be living there:
Compare with these more cluttered affairs, filled with alkin books, rugs, photos, and the like, and the difference in the amount of personality that shines through is like night and day:
I donât know. Maybe iâm just grumpy and nostalgic. What do you think?
TIL that subwoofers are just the bottom end of a whole range of animal-noise terms for speakers. Subwoofers are the biggest and bassiest, but then you have woofers, squawkers, tweeters, and even supertweeters! Neat.
Walking the Blyth and Tyne, part two: Oh, Delaval is a terrible place
Last time on The Garden: A strip mall turns out to be a place of immense historical curiosity, i am interrupted by a rude troupe of boy racers, and find myself caught up in the lyrics of a pro-union folk song.
Leaving Seghill, going past a house with a conspicuous Northumbrian flag, the landscape once again slips swiftly back into ruralia â a common occurrence on this leg of the journey. No sooner had i left behind the station house than i found myself on a dirt path which i wasnât quiiiite sure i was meant to be on.
This was the small hamlet of Mare Close, essentially a farmhouse surrounded by a few cottages. I have a sneaking suspicion that everyone living there has been friends since primary school, though i'll never know for sure. Opposite the cottages, by the next leg of my route, lay a small village church and graveyard which i dared not enter. Onwards.
Seaton DelavalÎą sits at the heart of the valley. Turning one way, there lies a charming local coĂśperative store, a genuine lordly manor (owned by the townâs namesake De la Val family, who came over after 1066), the previously-blogged village of Holywell, and, eventually, the seaside settlement of Seaton Sluice.β Unfortunately, weâll be turning the other way, by where once stood a colliery.
The former site of Delavalâs station can hardly be considered a sight for sore eyes. Cars and lorries pass by, horns blaring, trying to weave their way between those turning into the nearby petrol station.Îł The location of the station itself is an uninspiring gravel pit on one site with an overgrown nettle-filled path on the other; next door is a chain pub whose car park will be getting embiggened to accommodate the extra traffic once the railway reopens.
It doesnât get much better. A few interesting-looking eateries (a grimy-looking cafĂŠ called âOnly Fools and Saucesâ, a venue by the name of the Secret Gardenδ with a wonderful hand-painted sign) added some initial spice, but soon i was back to the same industrial wasteland: Auto recycling! Furniture wholesalers! Caravan storage! Chemical producers! The works!
...I said something about a colliery, didnât i?
16 January, 1862. Itâs half past ten â or, at least, it might be. Youâve been labouring away in the coal pit since two in the morning, and youâve not seen the sun since. The shift is almost over, and itâs time to swap over with the next group.
One by one, your comrades file in line to get out. A huddle of people enter the rusting lift. The familiar ketter-ketter-ketter shudders through the cave â but then, for a fraction of a second, all falls silent.
Your heart races. A drop of water falls from the ceiling. Nobody makes a sound.
And then, all of a sudden, it is as though Thorâs hammer has crashed into the ground. The earth around you shakes in terror, lets out what can only be described as an otherworldly scream, as ten tonnes of blood-red steel smash into the floor.
This was the Hartley Pit disaster, and its shockwaves can still be heard across town.
Just across from the telltale jackhammers and yellow tape of a housing estate so new Google Maps hasnât caught up yetÎľ sits a lovely memorial garden, explaining the story of the tragedy, with a poem to contemplate as you ramble along the path.
In terms of stations, the town has had two â Hartley and Hartley Pit â both right next to each other, and neither seeming to have any chance of reopening.
I was a bit anxious about continuing on, because there were several serious-looking men in hard-hats and high-vis jackets, but they didnât seem to mind. They really, really should have tried to stop me from going to where i was going next.
Coming up on The Garden: your author tries not to disturb some horses, desperately tries to avoid going to fucking Blyth, and accidentally sneaks in a brief trip to Durham. I promise, it makes sense in context.
Mx van Hoornâs link roundup, Volume I
I figure over time dates will get ambiguous â itâs time to start numbering these bad boys, from the top. Five for your perusal this time aroundâŚ
- The New Republic on the claimed devolution of Thom Yorkeâs songwriting â well-argued, but themâs fighting words!
- Monkeytype, a ridiculously customisable words-per-minute type-tester â clearly someoneâs passion project⌠With proper punctuation turned on, I get around 127 w.p.m, which is apparently four times as fast as the average? đ
- Seinfeld, but itâs a Don Bluth cartoon from the â90s â shockingly well done
- Newtonâs fractal â maths nerds only; the plot twist at the end will shock you
- Some fun Ascii calendars
WashingtonWormhole
Look â reader, i understand this about as much as you do. It just popped up in my recommendations one day. I watched the entire series of videos this is apparently a part of, and i still donât feel like i get it. Something about James Dean and evil national landmarks?
This is one of the better-done things in the recent wave of âanalogue horrorâ that has been circulating the interwebs â short, spooky videos taking inspiration from late-night public television or other media of the past. I just think it's neat. Anyone else want to go through the WASHINGTONWORMHOLE?