Friday Ephemera
In the land of the ludicrous. || Yes, darling, it’s an emerald. || Dolls for the different. || Lion-deterring technology. || Tommy and Tuppence: By the Pricking of My Thumbs. || Imperfection detected, solution devised. || I did not know these existed. || “Nail-scratching genuine-tapestry weave.” || Woke engineering class. || Guardian not happy. || His skateboard is longer than yours. || Houseguests ahoy. || Harrods for everything. (h/t, Things) || A real-time map of lightning strikes. || Explanatory graphics of note. || Beach fashion of note. || Volleyball from above. || The snore of the hummingbird. || October 30, 1961. || “Soon the Earth will be smashed to atoms!” || And finally, a very short quiz.
“In the land of the ludicrous”
If only we could identify the nitwit behind the camera, we could point out that she’s speaking English (not “Black owned”), benefiting from electricity (not “Black owned”), using a smartphone (not “Black owned”), in airconditioning (not “Black owned”)….and an endless list of “culturally appropriated” benefits invented by Caucasian people that she needs to stop using immediately.
Lion-deterring technology.
The eyes have it.
Explanatory graphics of note.
The all time, hands down, definitive demonstration of the uselessness of PissPoint as a method of presenting information.
Beach fashion of note.
Yes, hipsters, by definition, are entirely lost and always catching up, Sacha Baron Cohen beat ’em to it years ago . . .
“Harrods for everything.”
Oh, yes. (Something I would have mentioned a couple of weeks ago if I ever remembered this stuff from one day to the next. But then it wouldn’t be Ephemera otherwise, would it?)
“Beach fashion of note.”
They’re just a couple of sleeves away from coming full-circle in almost exactly a century.
Oh, yes.
That was a lot of money to ask for a sedan you could no longer properly fuck in.
Harrods for everything.
“Market?” asked Richard.
“The Floating Market. But you don’t want to know about that. No more questions.”
. . .
“He’s from the Upside,” said the guide. (Iliaster? thought Richard.) “Was asking about the Lady Door. And the Floating Market. Brought him to you, Lord Rat-speaker. Figured you’d know what to do with him.”
. . . .
“It’s the Floating Market, silly. I told you already. It moves. Different places. Last one I went to was held in that big clock tower. Big . . . someone. And the next was—”
. . . .
“There?” he said, appalled.
The woman nodded. “There.” The building was large, and it was covered with many thousands of burning lights. Conspicuous coats of arms on the wall facing them proudly proclaimed that it sold all sorts of things by appointment to various members of the British Royal Family. Richard, who had spent many a footsore weekend hour trailing behind Jessica through every prominent shop in London, recognized it immediately, even without the huge sign, proclaiming it to be, “Harrods?”
The woman nodded. “Only for tonight,” she said. “The next market could be
anywhere.”
“But I mean,” said Richard. “Harrods.”
. . .
Richard stood there, alone in the throng, drinking it in. It was pure madness—of that there was no doubt at all. It was loud, and brash, and insane, and it was, in many ways, quite wonderful. People argued, haggled, shouted, sang. They hawked and touted their wares, and loudly declaimed the superiority of their merchandise. Music was playing—a dozen different kinds of music, being played a dozen different ways on a score of different instruments, most of them improvised, improved, improbable. Richard could smell food. All kinds of food—the smells of curries and spices seemed to predominate, with, beneath them, the smells of grilling meats and mushrooms. Stalls had been set up all throughout the shop, next to, or even on, counters that, during the day, had sold perfume, or watches, or amber, or silk scarves. Everybody was buying. Everybody was selling. Richard listened to the market cries as he began to wander through the crowds.
“Lovely fresh dreams. First-class nightmares. We got ’em. Get yer lovely nightmares here.”
“Weapons! Arm yourself! Defend your cellar, cave, or hole! You want to hit ’em? We got ’em. Come on darling, come on over here . . . ”
“Rubbish!” screamed a fat, elderly woman, in Richard’s ear, as he passed her malodorous stall. “Junk!” she continued. “Garbage! Trash! Offal! Debris! Come and get it! Nothing whole or undamaged! Crap, tripe, and useless piles of shit. You know you want it.”
A man in armor beat a small drum and chanted, “Lost Property. Roll up, roll up, and see for yourself. Lost property. None of your found things here. Everything guaranteed properly lost.”
Richard wandered through the huge rooms of the store, like a man in a trance. He was unable to even guess how many people there were at the night market. A thousand? Two thousand? Five thousand?
—Neil Gaiman, Neverwhere
I find reading Gaiman’s prose fiction a bit like reading a screenplay for a Jim Henson movie.
Guardian not happy.
“One of the spoof headlines that was shared on social media in July appears to have been taken as genuine by some.”
Only one?
Morning, all.
Only one?
And so, a newspaper famed far and wide for its incompetence with statistics and figures generally, and which unironically employs Owen Jones, Laurie Penny and Carole Cadwalladr, and whose own writers have assumed that screengrabs of actual Guardian content must in fact be parodies, fears that it’s reputation is being undermined.
We live in strange times.
One more time. They’re just like normal people.
Not deranged in any way.
Dolls for the different.
A story to make my coming day that much better.
Not deranged in any way.
That made me angry.
That made me angry.
It’s a ball of insatiable malice, and beyond help. Or as Instapundit put it, “The whole point of leftist politics is to give people an excuse to feel good about being mean.” Which may explain why the left attracts so many Ladies of Cluster B™.
A story to make my coming day that much better.
That made me angry.
Today’s word is juxtaposition.
I recall the TV adaptation of Neverwhere as being most enjoyable complete with a young Peter Capaldi camping it up as the evil Angel Islington.
Not deranged in any way.
I’m truly beyond caring. If there were snipers on rooftops who picked these vermin off I’d applaud at this stage – but I’m a reactionary that way.
What I want to know is, what were the other side (Trump White House\GOP) thinking? The streets of the capitol are still pretty much run by scum so let’s hold an election event and not ensure the attendees have security to get safely home.
Obviously the first thought is that if you need security to ensure you’re not accosted leaving an election event in the capitol of the country perhaps the country is already lost? Best not to go down that rabbit hole.
And finally, a very short quiz.
I thought the hands must’ve been photoshopped.
Woke engineering class.
Seems to me, we need to challenge that professor as to why there are not more white people or, especially, women in those courses. I’d fear for the future when engineers cannot see reasons for the realities that have been there right before their (supposedly) woke eyes their entire lives. I would. But as it’s already built in to my ambient angst anyway…
That made me angry.
Mission accomplished.
Mission accomplished.
You see, they’re showing us how much they care. With their pathological selfishness and lack of empathy.
Explanatory graphics of note
I’m trying to figure out if that is 180 degrees from engineering drawings or some smaller number.
Two items. Possibly related.
Via Julia.
It’s a ball of insatiable malice, and beyond help.
I’d like to think that if I were in that man’s shoes, my only reaction would be, “Lady, you’ve gotta scream and jump up and down like a retarded bunny rabbit, I’m gonna have to ask you to wear a tighter shirt.”
Beach fashion of note.
Hard pass.
Dolls for the different.
Very cool project and a heartwarming story, but the euphemisms are a little out of control: “…a unique kind of doll making: look-alikes for those with visible physical differences.”
Maybe I’m gifted, but I’m able to see ‘visible physical differences’ between almost everybody.* Heck, I briefly dated a twin and I could reliably tell her from her sister when they thought it would be fun to mess with me.
How much time did the writer and editor spend discussing the phrasing? Probably boiled down to “a picture’s worth a thousand words,” in the end. Still, I continue to find it puzzling that my Moral Superiors can loudly proclaim that Diversity Is Strength, and Different Is Good, and Nonconformity Makes You Special, and in the next breath can condemn any language that might describe ways that a person breaks with the norm.
(Can we still say ‘norm’?)
* Except perhaps the women churned out of Beverly Hills plastic surgeon’s offices.
I’m not exactly sure why but I really like This.
Not deranged in any way.
And not one irony gene among them.
I’m not exactly sure why but I really like this.
I’d probably appreciate the ‘bardcore’ cover versions more if I were familiar with the tracks they’re covering, which, by and large, I’m not.
And not one irony gene among them.
But, apparently, we mustn’t “tone police,” as that would be racist, and sexist, and an affront to the transgendered. Instead, we must allow hysterical morons and people high on malice to be as shrill and threatening as they wish for as long they wish, until, exhausted, we submit. Because – magic words – “social justice.” Again, it’s curious just how often these elaborate rationalisations sound like they were devised primarily to excuse Cluster B behaviour.
Seen here, a young gentleman making a valid point.
short quiz
“This tweet is from a suspended account.” So there’s that.
“This tweet is from a suspended account.”
Bugger. I’d forgotten how much the Twitter scolds enjoy their work.
But, apparently, we mustn’t “tone police,”
One of the funniest conversations I can remember came when a feminist friend-of-a-friend had too much to drink at a dinner party and started foaming at the mouth over whatever the cause du jour was at that time. I was the designated driver, so I hadn’t had nearly enough to drink to make fighting fun, and so I just rebutted her rants as calmly as I could, trying to channel my inner Dr. Peterson.
I realized very quickly that my sense of calm was driving this woman absolutely out of her mind, so I stuck with it. Each calm rebuttal just sent her further ’round the bend. It culminated with her screaming “WHY AREN’T YOU ANGRY? HOW CAN YOU BE SO CALM?!” To which I asked, “Are you really policing my tone?”
At that point, the light bulb came on and she told me off properly. Still, for a party with the wife’s friends where I had to stay sober, it was a hell of a good time.
my sense of calm was driving this woman absolutely out of her mind,
I’d imagine that many of us have encountered people who inhibit even polite criticism of their arguments or behaviour by reacting with disproportionate agitation, even rage, thereby making any attempt at correction way too much effort and most likely futile. And it’s often done knowingly. The self-serving waffle about “tone policing” seems designed to excuse such behaviour.
Remember when Elijah Cummings and others walked through a crowd of Tea Party Patriots and then had to invent a story that racial slurs were hurled at them because no camera or phone caught any such language? Compare that to the treatment of guests leaving the White House last night.
“And not one irony gene among them.”
It’s not that; they’re just bloody idiots.
Anyway, fun with geometry (or “YouTube crossover of note”).
Adam:
“Others” specifically means the sainted John Lewis. He of the multiple funerals and lying in state (As opposed to lying in congress. For about 40 years).
Have we had a ‘you’re a bad person’ test yet today.
Maybe this will sort us out.
Maybe this will sort us out.
It is the only way they’ll learn. Though repeated treatments may be necessary.
Compare and contrast.
Bats filmed the wrong way up: https://twitter.com/MeanAnimals/status/1298335589348122626
Have we had a ‘you’re a bad person’ test yet today.
Maybe this will sort us out.
I’m still laughing. What a shot.
Have we had a ‘you’re a bad person’ test yet today.
I was thinking this needed Bob Menery commentating, but this guy did an excellent job.
Instead, we must allow hysterical morons and people high on malice to be as shrill and threatening as they wish for as long they wish, until, exhausted, we submit.
We, the privileged, must never interrupt, question, or counter any statements made by they, the oppressed. This is the only that is right and just.
It is a marvelous con, if one is devoid of conscientious consciousness.
*way
Oh, bother.
It is a marvellous con,
A great deal of woke posturing – sorry, theorising – does sound like an attempt to excuse and encourage antisocial behaviour. A license for spite, bullying and outright thuggery, all cloaked in self-flattery and pretentious victimhood.
You can imagine the kinds of people to whom that might appeal.
And by might, I mean does.
Compare and contrast.
Somebody should inform Kim Jones that Monopoly boards don’t have a memory, and that a lot of brown people who showed up 25 years ago with forty bucks and a dream have built successful businesses and comfortable lives. And that Rosewood and Tulsa are a hundred years and a thousand miles distant, and are parables about the 2nd Amendment far more than about George Floyd. And that in the here and now, the police are responsible for a vanishingly small number of the premature deaths in her community.
I’m tempted to create a version of Monopoly that includes four “Easy Money” spaces on the board. The spaces are split — top half is for players holding a card marked “Dad,” and cause you to lose a turn because you’ve been grounded. Bottom half is for players without the Dad card, who collect an extra $100 the first three times, and then go to jail on the fourth. Too obvious?
According to Wikipedia “In 2004, Kendi received dual Bachelor of Science* degrees in African American Studies and magazine production from Florida A&M University”.
His choice of degree was wise; everyone else’s choice is part of “societie’s (sic) systemic problems in engineering”.
*BS, for real.
Bats filmed the wrong way up: “>https://twitter.com/MeanAnimals/status/1298335589348122626
With fond reminisces.
The legal director for the ACLU in New Jersey, Jeanne LoCicero, told the Associated Press, “the idea of sending a bill to protesters is shocking.”
https://townhall.com/tipsheet/bronsonstocking/2020/08/28/teen-who-organized-black-lives-matter-protest-gets-bill-from-mayor-for-police-overtime-n2575287?utm_campaign=inarticle
When Karma hits you fast and hard.
Best belly laugh this week.
Again, it’s curious just how often these elaborate rationalisations sound like they were devised primarily to excuse Cluster B behaviour.
That. 🙂
That. 🙂
Well, it is, I think, significant, given the apparent prevalence of Cluster B personalities among Antifa and leftist groups generally. Just as it seems significant that the topic of “tone policing” should crop up repeatedly in a stridently leftist publication whose contributors boast of their mental health issues, including Cluster B disorders, with jolly cartoons on how to take your mood stabilisers and anti-psychotic medication.
Not a coincidence, I think.
There’s something… unhappy about the repeated use of the word “valid” and the gushing fluff about being “awesome” – “you’re cool and special and valued just as you are.” As if compulsive self-mutilation were little more than a faintly eccentric lifestyle choice and not to be judged by others as a cause for concern.
Ahem:
Human beings sit in a cave, in chains, their backs to the entrance. The shadows of things moving outside are projected by the light onto an inner wall of the cave. As the prisoners have never been outside the cave since birth, they believe these shadows are reality. One of them succeeds in freeing himself and walks outside into the light. He realizes that he has lived his whole life in the shadow of an illusion. Delighted by his discovery, he returns to the cave to communicate it to the others. Violence erupts between the one who ventured outside and those who do not want to understand. The story ends with the death of the person that had gained insight into reality.
Remember This?
Here’s the Follow-up:
via Second City Bureaucrat
With fond reminisces.
D’oh! I thought it vaguely familiar, but couldn’t remember why. Barkeep – book me an hour in the correction booth please.
D’oh! I thought it vaguely familiar, but couldn’t remember why.
You mean to tell me the 13,000 or so ephemera items haven’t been individually seared into your memory?
With fond reminisces.
D’oh!
A situational annoyance is that something is broken in the item links for that page.
The reminisces link is for Posted by: David | August 14, 2020 at 08:30, but one gets dumped out onto the second page, rather than being taken to a particular spot on the first page.
—And random testing on assorted item links on this and other pages around that day do get the expected behavior of getting whatever is . . .
Awfully sad news this morning about the death of Chadwick Bozeman.
But just heard on the BBC lunchtime news report: ‘He made Black Panther, a film with a mostly-black cast, which was praised for its diversity..’ 🤔
‘He made Black Panther, a film with a mostly-black cast, which was praised for its diversity..’
I once saw an all-black school praised for its ‘diversity’.
I have just seen the movie referred to as “speculatively brilliant”.
Should I laugh, or cry?
Should I laugh, or cry?
Not sure. Depends on what “speculatively brilliant” even means…or not. Sigh…when I was a boy, words had some semblance of meaning, IYKWIM.
I have just seen the movie referred to as “speculatively brilliant”.
What movie is that?
Remember Kim Jones above in my “compare and contrast” comment? She of the “looting is cool because those poor people have no other way to get stuff they need” emoting?
Well, meet Vicky Osterwell, who is more articulate with her gaslighting. After all, she’s just written a book about defending looting (she even contends the phrase “looting” is racist)
she even contends the phrase “looting” is racist
Rationalising feral predation and sociopathic selfishness is so now.
What movie is that?
Black Panther, a film the plot of which might easily have been woven by an eight year old boy during an evening of playing with his GI Joes… were it not for the racialist fantasy and wahmen empowerment threads.
I’m not defending any situation in which property is stolen by force.
Presumably that is a typo, and she meant The Force. It can’t possibly be that she is so dim, so sheltered, or so mendaciousness as to imply that looting is accomplished without acts and threats of mundane violence.
ephemera items seared into your memory
Origami jelly donuts – check. 1/8 scale replica of the city of Petra made out of Splenda packets – check. Something else . . . something else . . something . .
But I will remember “seared into [my] memory” haha, good one!
Black Panther, a film the plot of which might easily have been woven by an eight year old boy…
Thanks, Squires. It was not clear from this thread what film that comment was referring to.
backslash eye, fingers crossed.
So you get to the heart of that property relation, and demonstrate that without police and without state oppression, we can have things for free.
A tiny flaw in Ms Osterwell’s logic, perhaps. Where does she think things come from? A magic thing tree? But never mind practicalities:
…it provides people with an imaginative sense of freedom and pleasure and helps them imagine a world that could be. And I think that’s a part of it that doesn’t really get talked about—that riots and looting are experienced as sort of joyous and liberatory.
A tiny flaw in Ms Osterweil’s logic
Having ploughed through to the end of that NPR interview, it’s not a flaw in her logic, it is a complete lack of joined-up thinking.
Where does she think things come from? A magic thing tree?
There is something to be said for dumping these Marxist “intellectuals” naked in a wilderness while telling them to create their socialist utopia.
ZeroHedge today has a piece on middle class residents fleeing Chicago, and quote one woman as follows:
“Another resident says she is looking to take her family and move about 50 miles outside of the city. “We’re just looking for more safety,” she said. Both her and her husband support the Black Lives Matter movement, she said, but living downtown it doesn’t matter.
Looting had broken our near her home on August 10 and came home from a late night dog walk to see people surrounding her parked car. “The cops were just going past, and people had shopping carts full of (stuff), and all you heard were sirens, glass shattering and shouting. And gunshots. It was just very jarring.”
She concluded, in peak liberal hypocrisy fashion: “I think people forget that people do live here, too — it’s not just the Guccis and the Jimmy Choo stores. And I completely support it all. You stealing shoes means nothing to me — that doesn’t hurt me at all. It’s just the fact that that brings more crime, and that does endanger me.””
I worry about the dog.
Jeff: A house in the Chicago area with recent nearby looting? Tough sale — she may be struggling in a wannabe-refugee market on both sides of her planned transaction. Maybe what she really needs is just some kind of predator-deterrent technology. Like the cattle-owners noted above. Or the villagers in the Sundarbans, a low-lying swampy area of Bangladesh, who were regularly preyed upon by resident tigers and found that wearing masks of human faces on the backs of their heads (the most common tiger attacks coming from behind) substantially reduced the rate of attack and related mortality. She could always consider investing in some BLM bumper stickers, yard signage, and personal wear items — those seem to be occasionally effective against the local predators.
Or she could just buy a Glock, of course. But how likely is that?
I’m not defending [just] any situation in which property is stolen by force.
@Squires I think that’s the angle Osterwell was going for – “don’t think that because I advocate for the theft of your stuff that it’s ok to steal my stuff.”
“don’t think that because I advocate for the theft of your stuff that it’s ok to steal my stuff.”
Give Osterwell a tenner in the Gulag. See how she likes it.
Correction: give a tenner to everyone at NPR.
Never underestimate the Democrats’ ability to go full retard:
https://twitter.com/rodbishop15/status/1299853166700384257
They’re a teachers union, naturally: https://twitter.com/CTULocal1/status/1299101069163859968
They’re a teachers union, naturally
The infantilism of many educators is, I think, worth noting.
They’re a teachers union, naturally:
Heh.
Well, meet Vicky Osterweil, who is more articulate with her gaslighting.
This is Osterwell writing in 2011 under another name:
Millenials all over the world have received a brutal political education. The lucky few of us paid far more and will get far less for our college degrees than any generation before, we have watched with dismay as our parents squabble over light bulbs while the seas boil, and we have witnessed the steady erosion of public space, individual rights, the fourth estate, and checks on executive power. America has been at war for basically the entire adult lives of everyone under 30.
I mean, if I didn’t know better that could literally have been written by Laurie Penny.
In fact, come to think of it, it really looks like it was:
This generation is on the cusp of waking up from the American Dream, just in time to see the urgency of the task ahead of us. We have five years until catastrophic climate change becomes a foregone conclusion, possibly far less time than that before the next massive financial crash, and 30 years of economic orthodoxy to turn around [ … ] no jobs, no prospects, no safe places to live, none of the things we played the game for all our young lives.
It was even published in The New Inquiry where Osterweil also publishes
Except that Penny’s piece comes almost eight months after Osterweil’s – which makes it tempting to suggest that this might be where the fondness for expropriation and looting began. But then there must be countless articles stamped in the same mould out there.
don’t think that because I advocate for the theft of your stuff that it’s ok to steal my stuff.
As Instapundit quipped, those inspired to looting and other lively and transgressive activities could always start at the offices of NPR, and then move on to the homes of NPR’s editors, and of course the homes of Ms Escobar and Ms Osterweil, who clearly find such things titillating. As they find thuggery and violation so arousing, so terribly radical, let them taste it first-hand.
We’ve been here before, of course.
And as non-reciprocal posturing is apparently a signature of leftist psychology, we most likely will again.
while the seas boil
Stupidity, willful ignorance or malice?
Stupidity…?
Or as recited by the bard himself…
https://youtu.be/MbBhMnlXBTE
Right, off to have lunch with Beloved Sister-in-Law #1.
Play nicely. Use coasters.
Let’s see what coasters are in the backpack…Thwaites, Cervoise, Brakina, Creemore, Cruzcampo…who wants a Mosi?
Darleen:
Just saw your VG post with a pic of V Osterweil. That is a very masculine-looking jaw. Are we fully informed?
Are we fully informed?
At the time of writing, I couldn’t find any confirmation on Osterweil’s biological reality. However, it’s been pointed out to me that Vicky was Willie and I tend to agree.
“Soon the Earth will be smashed to atoms!”
Just finished watching all 3:52:12 of that. Pure, campy fun. No politics, no race morality, no intersectionality. Just pure, campy fun.
Dale Arden and Princess Aura: the first Betty vs. Veronica showdown?
Also, I had the strangest urge to put on shorts and a cape. (Fortunately, my wife stopped me.)
How about, Flash Gordon tells the observatory scientists that the whole world must shut down all electrical generation so his spaceship can land–and they do!
What can’t Dr. Zarkov invent? Rays seem to be his specialty. He invents a ray of invisibility and a ray that supports Prince Vultan’s city in the sky. Who needs Flash Gordon with that kind of inventiveness around?
Did I mention Dale Arden and Princess Aura?
“Never underestimate the Democrats’ ability to go full retard:”
It’s like they read Atlas Shrugged and thought the villains were the good guys.
“paid far more and will get far less for our college degrees than any generation before”
Adam Smith, like all of his contemporaries, paid his professors at the door in gold (having walked the 45 miles from Kirkcaldy to Glasgow). At least the second part of the statement rings true.
Surely the point of volleyball is to watch from … well a lower position than that.
What I want to know is, what were the other side (Trump White House\GOP) thinking?
I think they’re thinking that the longer they let this kind of thing go on, the bigger the Trump landslide in November, and it’s got to be bigger than the margin of fraud.
They’re clearly playing the long game: intervening now will save a small number of people but could lose Trump the election; allowing the Cluster B Left to reveal themselves full-throat means a second Trump term and preserves the Republic.
I don’t know. I think we passed the moral event horizon a while ago; the President failing to step in and enforce order in DC at the very least seems like a moral failing to me, if not necessarily a political one.
I have just seen the movie referred to as “speculatively brilliant”.
People really don’t like it when I point out that both The Lion King and the original Black Panther origin were written by white men and are just rehashes of Hamlet (more obviously in TLK), also written by a white man.
I didn’t care for Black Panther, if I’m honest. There are some very good scenes, but the movie as a whole is poorly written and paced and Bozeman had all the screen presence of a cement block. In a movie where you’re playing opposite Andy Serkis and Michael B. Jordan, that’s not a great look.